Friday 16 August: Unions indulged while pensioners suffer: welcome to life under Labour

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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679 thoughts on “Friday 16 August: Unions indulged while pensioners suffer: welcome to life under Labour”

  1. Good morning, chums. And thank you, Geoff, for today's NoTTLe site.

    Wordle 1,154 6/6

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      1. Not really, Citroen. These days I tend to wake up at 12.15 am and (i) check my bank balance to ensure I have not been hacked and lost my modest savings, and then (ii) work on today's Wordle in total silence. Then back to bed, although this morning I did a few minutes sorting some of my gardening "trimmings" in my garage before checking the NoTTLe site, when to my amazement, Geoff had just posted today's site. So I entered my Wordle result and then went back to bed. I overslept! It's now 9 am and I am catching up on today's site's posts. Thanks for asking (and Good Morning to you, btw).

    2. Loads of options!
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  7. We can no longer say that Britain is a free country. 16 August 2024.

    The political and professional classes more broadly are obsessed with so-called misinformation or disinformation, and now have a new weapon in the “false communication” provision. And finally, society has developed a culture of avoiding offence and protecting people from seeing anything that might upset them, and hence of believing that some sorts of speech should be prevented.

    We are heading towards a real crisis. There has always been some censorship in Britain, more’s the pity, but until recently it was artistic and cultural, not political. We prided ourselves on being a free country in which we could speak freely. We simply cannot say that now. We are, in fact, all vulnerable. Say the wrong thing in the wrong way at the wrong moment, and any of us might find the police at our door.

    The deafening silence from the MSM and Political Elites tell you everything you need to know. The UK is a judicious Police State little different from China or North Korea.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/15/we-can-no-longer-say-that-britain-is-a-free-country/

  8. Flagship green fuel factory scrapped in net zero blow

    State-owned Norwegian energy giant Ørsted says there is a lack of demand for e-fuel

    Jonathan Leake
    15 August 2024 • 2:45pm

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/business/2024/08/15/TELEMMGLPICT000390149304_17237293180250_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqqVzuuqpFlyLIwiB6NTmJwWJKHVq56c9sYypHqwk1f_A.jpeg?imwidth=680 Work has halted on the FlagshipONE project, a proposed e-methanol plant in the Swedish town of Örnsköldsvik

    *******************************
    Simon Scott
    12 HRS AGO
    The ‘battle’ to reach net zero?!
    Right now any effort to reach net zero seems a western folly to hamstring our economies in Favour of our competitors. Particularly China, who is rather more than a mere competitor.
    Nothing the entirety of Europe can do will touch the sides of the carbon China is spewing to make and sell us very environmentally unfriendly, windmills, panels and batteries.
    Only Minibrain could think it a good idea.

    Nigel Hook
    12 HRS AGO
    Reply to Simon Scott
    China has just built the world's largest ever oil platform. Get it Ed Marxband?

    Les Kaye
    15 HRS AGO
    Øh dear.
    Q. Why do state owned businesses always screw up?
    A. Because for the overpaid the civil servants involved, there is no downside. The longer that they can drag it out the better.

  9. David Lammy’s new hire shows the Foreign Office’s true colours

    Minouche Shafik appears to be another prominent public figure with a blind spot towards anti-Semitism

    NICOLE LAMPERT
    15 August 2024 • 6:35pm

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2024/08/15/TELEMMGLPICT000390100286_17237431126690_trans_NvBQzQNjv4Bq2xH_am5qyIBBe32ZCWDxVHwSCF1R0VweJ7DS2UnVMSQ.jpeg?imwidth=680

    Taking the helm of one of America’s oldest and most prestigious universities as its first-ever female president on October 4, 2023, Minouche Shafik spoke the progressive mumbo jumbo required. She was committed, she said, to the tenets of “diversity and inclusion” and Columbia University should be “a beacon in this world”. Hamas invaded Israel just three days later and it’s fair to say her high-minded hopes evaporated quicker than you can say the words, “social justice warriors and their anti-Semitic blind spot”.

    Baroness Shafik’s name will now go down in infamy as that of a university leader whose ham-fisted attempt to quieten down anti-Semitic pro-Palestinian protests led to Columbia becoming an epicentre of a new brand of violent activism which had the world aghast. After a summer break that saw calls for her to be fired from across the American political divide, and three members of her staff forced out after it emerged they’d mocked Jewish students complaining of anti-Semitism as coming from “a place of privilege”, she has resigned three weeks before a new term starts.

    Typically, in that way that establishment people only ever fall up, however much they fail, the former deputy governor of the Bank of England and director of the London School of Economics has been given a plum new job by David Lammy, leading a review in the Foreign Office on the UK’s approach to international development.

    Announcing her resignation, the crossbench peer, ennobled by Boris Johnson after he failed to make her Bank of England boss, gave a typical example of what the youngsters would call a humble brag. “My whole professional life has been devoted to public service and my time at Columbia has been an important part of that commitment,” she said of a role that came with a £12 million mansion.

    Failing to apologise for months of hatred on campus, which led to a university Rabbi telling Jewish students that “extreme anti-Semitism” made it too dangerous to attend, and which eventually led to all lessons going online and graduation ceremonies being cancelled, she actually patted herself on the back. “Even as tension, division and politicisation have disrupted our campus over the last year, our core mission and values endure,” she insisted.

    The truth is that, for months, anti-Semitism went unpunished and therefore mushroomed. By the time she realised she had to take a stand with actions not just words – when fellow Ivy League presidents slowly lost their jobs after they failed to say that calling for the genocide of Jews was wrong – it was too late. Calling the police on protesters led only to more “occupations” which were copied all over the world, including in the UK.

    You might think she will be right at home in Lammy’s Foreign Office, given that he made restoring funding to UNRWA, a UN agency that had housed Hamas terrorists, one of his first acts. Standing down a challenge to the International Criminal Court against its application to target Benjamin Netanyahu for war crimes came next. Lammy’s feed on X is, meanwhile, filled with attacks on Israel.

    Shafik appears to be another prominent public figure with a blind spot towards anti-Semitism – like so many associated with Labour, which only came out of special measures for acting unlawfully in its treatment of Jewish members 18 months ago. We are beginning to see a pattern and it is becoming increasingly uncomfortable.

    ************************
    nick chislett
    12 HRS AGO
    Beyond parody and satire. It’s chilling to think that Lammy could be in charge at a time of war.

    Ryan Brighton
    10 HRS AGO
    Reply to nick chislett – view message
    It'll be hilarious.
    Imagine watching Keir Starmer trying to persuade the white working-class to sign up and join the army after all that has happened.

    geoffrey bell
    10 HRS AGO
    We know all about Lammy. Calling Trump a nazi, calling Tory politicians Paedophiles, comparing the Brexit supporting ERG to nazi’s, correcting himself and saying that comparing the ERG to the nazis was not strong enough (one killed 6 million Jews, the other wanted to leave a trade block, so maybe he has a point) and now a clearly and demonstrably anti-Semitic attitude to Israel as it defends its very existence. Makes you wonder who the real nazi actually is?

    Andrew Sutherland
    11 MIN AGO
    It would be more of a surprise if that racist Lammy appointed someone sensible rather than a predictable woke failed leftie.

    Larry Kelly
    16 MIN AGO
    The woman is utterly utterly talentless but she is one of the leftie cabal that cycle through jobs with the UN, WHO, WEF and others. She is hoovering up $$$ while having zero discernible talent.

    2. More to the point, she's a serial failure. We don't need any more of those leaching off the public purse.
      I suppose she makes Lammy look good in comparison.

      1. No, not a failure, she was a highly respected economist working for the DFID as a senior civil servant.
        Still visits her extended family in Egypt, and I doubt that she is particularly anti-semitic.
        However it is absurd to label her as British-American when she was born Egyptian, and comes from a distinguished family.

    3. Baroness Shafik studied economics and was awarded several degrees.
      Described by the MSM as "British-American", she was born in Egypt to parents who APPEAR to have been Egyptian citizens, ergo she is Egyptian, and there is nothing wrong with that. A clever lass who obtained two valuable citizenships.
      It is the phrase 'British-American' which irritates me, although the lady herself could be a charming person.

  10. G'morning
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  12. ‘Quiet, sheltered’ 53-year-old grandmother sentenced to 15 months after ‘hateful’ social media post following Southport stabbings

    BELOW THE LINE.

    Peter McAvoy..

    Most of the comments are now getting deleted, welcome to 1984.

    I’ve chosen Mr McAvoys comment because it illustrates a truth obvious to regular readers of the Telegraph. There’s also another element to the posts. The supporters of the sentence and Government policy.

    m Gandy.
    Let her out.

    Reply by Jerry Williams.
    Jerry Williams.
    Lock her up

    At the moment they are swamped by the sheer number of naysayers but they are doing their best to undermine these. They are almost certainly Government Trolls.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/15/keyboard-warrior-mosque-blown-up-jailing-over-the-top/

    1. Do you remember that retired man who was sentenced to 18 months in jail for shouting "who the f* is allah"?
      Well some footage has surfaced on twitt that shows him wandering around in a very peaceful way, reacting slightly when the police violently arrest a woman in front of him, speaking to a police officer in a conversational way, and then the police jumping on him to arrest him. just before he is arrested, he has both hands held out in a classic "why?" gesture as he looks at police violence.

      Yesterday, I re-posted this footage, and my twitt a/c was promptly locked for sharing violent images.
      Sharing images of government violence apparently does not fall under Musk's "free speech."
      And people still think he is on their side!

      More to the point, if this image was banned by twitt, why could I see it and share it when twitt presumably already knew it showed violent arrests. Will my followers see the re-posted tweet, so that they in turn can get locked for sharing it further?
      It's all just mind games.

      I guess we will need some frightful digital id to go on social media soon, so I'm signing up to several email newsletters for my news now. Might get a sub to Trends journal as well.

        1. I'm blocked from Twitter, so no! It was put out with an analysis by a video blogger whom I've never heard of, working in the style of Richard D Hall. Looked legit though.

        2. Seems to be a soccer supporters' chant, and there are millions of those in the UK. Here is a partial link for information only. (for the well known video company's search box)

          jl7CKqlVucw

      2. Wow. I do so hope someone will take on the appeals for these people and that this all comes out. It’s truly incredible.

        1. We need a bunch of Solicitors, well versed in Common Law and Magna Carta, and why Parliament hate them both.

      4. He must have pleaded guilty to something but having watched a video pug on here by ogga he must have been sentenced to something else. Of course if he appeals that is likely to take years before it’s heard.
        The country is sinking lower and lower into the mire.

      5. TB has posted the whole video this morning – it's still up on Tw'tX. You can try appealing but in 2020 my account was suspended for five months.

  13. Morning, all Y'all.
    Sunny. Day off to fix the garden a bit, then to Firstborns to continue working his honey room.

  14. Good morning everyone.
    There is an article today about being Jewish in Britain. The headline on theTelegraph's front page is "‘Friends no longer speak to me’: How it feels to be a British Jew since October 7 " (sic, 7th). Fortunately, one of the leading the BTL comments beat me to it, because I wanted to shout

    "These people were never “your friends”. Be glad they have shown their true colours and you are rid of them. There are plenty of us that have massive respect and zero animosity for those of the Jewish faith. "

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/15/how-it-feels-to-be-a-british-jew-since-october-7/#comment

  15. The interviews herein with the Great American Public are hilarious and very scary

    MARLOW: Democrat Voters Support Harris Based on Her ‘Vibe’, Say ‘She’s Good for Women’

    https://nttl.blog/friday-16-august-unions-indulged-while-pensioners-suffer-welcome-to-life-under-labour/

    Breitbart News Editor-in-Chief Alex Marlow pointed out that Democrats’ reasons for supporting Vice President Kamala Harris for president consisted of her “vibe,” and her being “good for women.”

    During an interview on the Charlie Kirk Show, Marlow referred to a video in which Frontlines reporter Kalen D’Almeida questioned several supporters of Harris at a rally in Phoenix, Arizona, and asked them what Harris’s accomplishments were. Marlow noted that among the reasons listed as to why people were supporting Harris, none of the people listed a “single accomplishment.”

    “What Kamala Harris’s greatest accomplishment has been as VP?” D’Almeida asked one man.

    “Uhm, I mean honestly, I’m not too into politics, I’m just here for the vibe,” the man answered.

    A second man stated, “Becoming the first female vice president.”

    “So, becoming, just becoming the vp is the best accomplishment?” D’Almeida asked, to which the person responded, “Yeah, absolutely.”

    “Being a good person,” a woman told D’Almeida, to which another woman agreed and added that Harris seems “really good for women.”

    “Harris is there with the energy, she has a lot of enthusiasm, so it’s important to get behind her,” the second guy added.

    Marlow interjected to point out that “so far” voters had stated they supported Harris for her “vibe,” because she was “good for women,” and that she “won the vice presidency.”

    “So far, we’ve got vibe, so the main thing is she’s got a good vibe. She’s good for women, which presumably means she likes abortions. I don’t know if it’s necessarily good for women, how she rose to the top. People like her, so she’s got enthusiasm, which is, a lot of this is astroturfed by the media. Which is – recall, she didn’t even make it to Iowa in the 2020 primary – and that she won the vice presidency, which you know, some of you in the audience might not think that that is a great accomplishment for a number of reasons. So far, that’s it. Not a single accomplishment. She’s got a great vibe and she won.”

    When asked about their favorite policies from Harris, one lady admitted that she wished she knew “more about” Harris’s policies.

    “My favorite policies, oh my gosh,” one lady said. “See, I wish they would tell us more about that because I honestly don’t know. I know she’s done some good work with immigration even though they say opposite.”

    “What do they say?” D’Almeida asked.

    “Well, what is it, she’s the ‘border czar’,” the lady answered, mockingly, as she seemed to assume the right would. “And, it’s her fault that all these immigrants are coming over, you know, to cross the border right now, which I don’t think they are.”

    One person stated that they did not think there was “an issue with the border at all,” while admitting that “illegal immigrants are coming to America.” The person stated that they feel America is about “letting people come in and do what they’d like.”

    “Yeah, I feel like yes, illegal immigrants are coming to America, but that’s what America’s all about, is to come to America and live that American dream,” the person explained to D’Almeida. “Because America isn’t just for the whites, it’s not just for the blacks, it’s not just for the Mexicans. It’s for everyone around the world, we’re supposed to be a country of letting people come in and do what they’d like. I mean, I understand that they say the border crisis is causing all these drug issues and it’s causing crime, but in my opinion, there’s crime everywhere. You can go to New York, you can go to Canada, you can go anywhere across the world and there’s going to be crime regardless.”

    “We’re seeing record levels of citizenship for immigrants – that are being announced by Democrats,” Marlow interjected. “Now, I’m all fine with immigration if it is for people we know are going to be helping the country. That’s not what we’re getting right now. We’re getting illegal immigration and then we’re getting people getting fast tracked, then they and their progeny become Democrats. That’s the goal. That’s what we’re seeing. That is the immigration policy of the [Biden-Harris administration.] These people are acting as though they’re not sure there’s an illegal immigration crisis, [and] that is an indictment of our media.”

    1. I was talking about this with my American friend the other night, and we agreed that it is unfathomable, and must be a media construct. She agrees that Harris was only chosen in the first place because she was the only person they could find who was even worse than Biden, so nobody would be tempted to depose him and make her President!

    3. Kamala Harris, Tim Walz Interview Each Other in Policy-Free Discussion as Both Continue to Dodge Press

      https://media.breitbart.com/media/2024/08/Kamala-and-Tim-Walz-Vibing-640×480.jpeg
      BRADLEY JAYE 15 Aug 20245,968
      4:16

      Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz finally granted an interview, not to a hostile – or even a friendly – press, but to themselves.

      The media-averse duo recorded a bizarre policy-free conversation cut together in the style of a free-wheeling interview released Thursday by the Harris-Walz campaign.

      Voters looking for where Harris and Walz stand on the economy, immigration, or any of the pressing issue sof our time won’t find it here. But the video was packed full of information for voters yearning to learn what Walz puts in his “white guy tacos” and tested the limits of how many of her trademark cackles self-proclaimed “hip-hop girl” Harris can fit inside a ten-minute video.

      Put simply, the video was full of vibes and vapidity.

      The perplexing video is unlikely to satisfy voters – much less an increasingly anxious media – longing to learn how Harris will govern differently than the unpopular administration in which she serves as the second highest ranking official.

      And while Bruce Springsteen fans might share Walz’s professed love of the musician, Walz continues to ignore the spiraling stolen valor scandal haunting the campaign since he joined the ticket.

      Walz has harangued anyone for questioning the value of a veteran’s service, although that ignores the criticisms, which arose over his repeated lying about his rank upon retirement, where he served, and whether he knew he would be deployed before he retired, among others.

      “We’re not attacking his honorable service. We’re attacking the dishonesty about that service. That is not honorable. That is the height of dishonor, and Tim Walz should not be the vice president of the United States because of it,” Sen. JD Vance (R-OH), Donald Trump’s running mate who served as a Marine in a public affairs role in a combat zone during the Iraq War, said at a rally Thursday.

      Trump and Vance have regularly taken media questions as they crisscross the nation.

      Harris has not held an unscripted press conference for 25 days since joining the 2024 presidential race.

      Even for campaign tripe, the video broke little ground. Harris’s perplexing affinity for Venn diagrams is well known, as is her love of the late Prince’s music.

      But this isn’t 1999, and she’s no longer an assistant district attorney (although she has run from her record as a law enforcement official). Campaigning to hold the highest office in the land while ignoring policy questions is a new and untested strategy.

      The video release coincides with reports from the Wall Street Journal that Harris campaign advisers worry about publicly releasing “thorny details” of their economic plan because the specifics might backfire.

      Those fears are likely justified. In the first inkling of her policy pronouncements, Harris is promising to institute a first-ever national ban on price gouging and price-fixing within her first 100 days in office in an effort to deflect many voters’ low marks for Biden’s handling of the economy.

      That task may be herculean, with Biden himself insisting that Harris owns the Biden-Harris economic record.

      Their record is ugly.

      Consumer prices have soared 20.2 percent since Biden and Harris took office 42 months ago, according to the Department of Labor’s Consumer Price Index (CPI), giving Harris and Biden the ignominious record for presiding over the worst inflation since the Jimmy Carter presidency.

      But for today, Harris appears to believe voters care more about her vinyl records than her economic record. And Harris and Walz are comfortable ignoring difficult economic questions – or any questions at all – to instead focus on their past careers as a lawyer in law and order-starved San Francisco and an assistant football coach back when rosters still included fullbacks.

      How long this strategy can last remains to be seen. But unless the campaign changes its trajectory, a forlorn Walz might one day look back at the time before he joined the ticket as his Glory Days.

  16. Good morning all.
    Clear skies, near calm air and a distinctly cool 5½°C on the Yard Thermometer.

    A BTL Comment:-

    R. Spowart
    1 min ago
    Message Actions
    "If, as the Chancellor keeps telling us, there is a black hole in Britain’s finances, why is the Government handing out pay rises like sweets?" asks Heather Erridge.
    As a REWARD Heather for continually embarrassing the previous Tory (In Name Only) Government.
    After Wilson won the "Who Rules Britain" election, one of his first actions was to give the miners, whose strike had led to the "3 day week", he gave the miners almost everything they'd been demanding.

    1. And not just pay rises – £11M for foreign green projects; yet more to Ukraine etc.

  17. Good morning all, went to bed early last night, a lot of catching up this morning.

  18. It’ll get one line on the bottom of page 10, while the hypnotised majority carry on thinking that the Government scotched violent anti muslim riots created by Nigel Farage’s rhetoric. (yes, that really is what they believe!)

  19. Home Office ‘considering banning silent prayer outside abortion clinics’. 16 August 2024.

    The Home Office is to consider banning silent prayer outside abortion clinics, The Telegraph understands.

    MPs voted for legislation last year which would ban protests, including silent prayer, within a buffer zone of 150 metres of a clinic or hospital providing abortion services, but it has not yet come into force.

    I don’t think that even North Korea has managed to criminalise pure thought. Societies (Cambodia, Rwanda) do occasionally go insane. That is where we are now.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/08/15/home-office-review-ban-silent-prayer-abortion-clinics/

    1. BTL Comment:-

      R. Spowart
      30 min ago
      Reply to Anastasias Revenge – view message
      Message Actions
      So can one stand outside a clinic and simply contemplate in a secular manner, so long as the Almighty does not enter your thoughts?

      1. 391685+ up ticks,

        Morning Bob,
        You are on WEF/NWO thin ice in mentioning " The Almighty" unless it is in a political elite manner.

      2. I'd better watch out.

        When I see a mosque my silent prayers are totally unacceptable. Totally rational mind, but unacceptable.

        1. But are your silent prayers within 150 metres of a mosque?

          If so, it could be an arrestable offence.

        2. But are your silent prayers within 150 metres of a mosque?

          If so, it could be an arrestable offence.

    3. Thought crime, straight from George Orwell.
      Whilst I am sanguine about the economic rationale behind deliberate abortion, it remains a terrible act, the slaughter of innocents and the death of innocence. Adoption has its disadvantages, but surely it is a better option than killing your own foetus.
      On that note, I read recently on Breitbart that the USA has a system of baby boxes at some Fire Stations. The article is about a baby recently placed in a baby box:
      https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2024/07/31/newborn-surrendered-safe-haven-baby-box-indiana/
      At least 16 American states have these facilities.

    4. Am I right to suppose that the praying person would have to be loitering within the 150 metres for a minimum time? What if someone is waiting for a bus, a lift or a friend, and do psychic powers have to come into play before an arrest?

      How about merely walking past and praying?

      Dickens, through his character Bumble, said "the law is an ass".

      From Google re "the law is an ass".

      The law, when applied too rigidly or too flexibly, can be blind to the realities on the ground and the requirements for justice.

      3. Dickens was referring to The Law's view that a man was responsible for his wife's views when, as Mr Bumble was very much aware, (once his proposal was accepted and he was married) that in his case it was the wife who "wore the pants" and he was totally unable to influence, let alone be responsible for, her views and actions.

  20. That was a bit chilly!!
    The DT did a load of washing yesterday evening and I've just been up the "garden" to hang it out.

    2. I’m not allowed to hang washing out. If I do, management comes along and rearranges it, apparently I get it all wrong. I’m actually quite happy with this arrangement!

      1. Ah! but you do it on purpose! My old man does the same with the dishwasher!!🙄 And he’s supposed to be an engineer…..

      2. That's right, do something wrong at home and you never get a chance to repeat it, do it in the snivel service and you get a promotion to your next level of incompetence.

  22. 391685+up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Surely this type of judge has got to be judged to be a danger to children if this is to be considered by the political overseers as being the RESET / NWO way and future normality then paedophilia will be given a teflon overcoat.

    Seems like going to court as with clinics / hospitals and doing a silent prayer number is also taboo, this is truly an attack on religion and a selective attack at that, seeing as a praying protected species is allowed to block the country's arteries unhindered.

    The peoples really must in future ( if there is another opportunity)
    have a very serious MIND RESET on entering a polling station.
    https://x.com/SandraWeeden/status/1824327364974641495

  23. 391685+up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Surely this type of judge has got to be judged to be a danger to children if this is to be considered by the political overseers as being the RESET / NWO way and future normality then paedophilia will be given a teflon overcoat.

    Seems like going to court as with clinics / hospitals and doing a silent prayer number is also taboo, this is truly an attack on religion and a selective attack at that, seeing as a praying protected species is allowed to block the country's arteries unhindered.

    The peoples really must in future ( if there is another opportunity)
    have a very serious MIND RESET on entering a polling station.
    https://x.com/SandraWeeden/status/1824327364974641495

  25. 391685+ up ticks,

    Brother you can hum that tune again, LOUDLY.

    Dt,

    Courts become more lenient on prolific offenders, figures show
    Two-thirds of criminals with dozens of previous convictions avoid jail sentences

    1. I am reminded of the role reversal in the Manchester airport incident, where the first videos off the mark showed police brutality but the follow up ones gave context.

        1. I think I heard something about a file being passed to the Manchester CPS( commonly known as the criminal protection society). Probably contains details of the policeman protecting his colleagues.

        2. The case has been passed to the CPS.
          Doubtless the perpetrators will be walking the streets while awaiting trial.
          If they are, compare and contrast with what has happened to the rioters, effectively blackmailed into guilty pleas under the threat of custody until trial, only to receive draconian “justice”

    4. I admit that I keep repeating this: I cannot understand how a man with a Jewish wife and Jewish children is so keen to advance the inevitable coming dominance of Islamic rule in the UK. By the same token I cannot understand why Lammy is so anti-white when he is married to a white woman.

      1. I guess it's an act, put on for the audience. Yet, they cannot see the likely outcome, or don't believe it, or reckon they can control it… maybe the recent locking away of those who dare to criticise the government is a desperate reaction to their rising understanding of what they have started and are losing control of.

      2. Wait until his Jewish wife and children are all raped and slaughtered. Might be a change of heart.

    1. I realise that the rail network is effectively government owned but the train operating companies are private. So how can the gov negotiate their driver's pay rates. I must have missed something..

    2. It doesn't seem to matter what these people get up to , the blob takes care of them.

      1. Thank you, Richard, I asked 3 times for that information on X, and received nary a word!

    4. A truly disgusting character. He should have his 'tackle' cut off and stitched to his forehead then exiled to Iran. or Bradford. and made to wander the streets in a Union Jack loincloth. I know, I know, you will say I am being too lenient but it is my deep rooted compassion which governs my humanity and fundamental clemency.

      1. 391685+ up ticks,

        Afternoon Ped,

        We are of the same mindset, too bloody soft is our trouble.

  29. I liked this letter .

    SIR – The Government appears to believe that train drivers are worth far more than nurses. They already receive twice as much as fully qualified registered nurses do.

    This is certainly not going to encourage young people to undertake nurse training, which takes a minimum of three years and ultimately comes with huge responsibilities for providing patient treatment and care. And if nurse recruitment and retention doesn’t increase, how is Labour going to improve the NHS?

    Cynthia Atwell
    Lichfield, Staffordshire

    Referring back to the train drivers and the hike in rail fares , we live in a village , and am lucky enough to have a mainline Waterloo/ Weymouth rail network ..

    People need to commute either to college, or job or even hospital appointments or even for a shopping trip .

    Season tickets cost a fortune . A real fortune to someone on a low salary . Car travel, share and care is onerous because the volume of rush hour traffic means that a half hour trip can suddenly become over an hour , but £15 rail return to Bournemouth .. dreadful .

    No wonder some people prefer to be on benefits.

    2. I have always thought that if the sole purpose of the daily commute is to go to work then the cost of so doing should be an allowable charge against tax.

      After all MPs seem to be able to claim virtually anything on expenses – such as the cost of heating their homes and even for pornography for their spouses, as in the case of the former home secretary, Jacqueline Jill Smith, Labour MP for Redditch from 1997 to 2010.

      This woman is now Baroness Smith of Malvern, and has recently been appointed as Minister of State for Skills.

      1. A point that is often overlooked is that if an ordinary working person claims an expense against his income tax he still has to pay for whatever it is he has spent out of his income but can just recover the tax. If he is an employee his business will pay for it but it is the business rather than the state which pays.

        If an MP claims an expense it is in effect a tax free gift from the state which means a free gift from the tax payer.

    3. I have always thought that if the sole purpose of the daily commute is to go to work then the cost of so doing should be an allowable charge against tax.

      After all MPs seem to be able to claim virtually anything on expenses – such as the cost of heating their homes and even for pornography for their spouses, as in the case of the former home secretary, Jacqueline Jill Smith, Labour MP for Redditch from 1997 to 2010.

      This woman is now Baroness Smith of Malvern, PC and has recently been appointed as Minister of State for Skills.

  30. I liked this letter .

    SIR – The Government appears to believe that train drivers are worth far more than nurses. They already receive twice as much as fully qualified registered nurses do.

    This is certainly not going to encourage young people to undertake nurse training, which takes a minimum of three years and ultimately comes with huge responsibilities for providing patient treatment and care. And if nurse recruitment and retention doesn’t increase, how is Labour going to improve the NHS?

    Cynthia Atwell
    Lichfield, Staffordshire

    Referring back to the train drivers and the hike in rail fares , we live in a village , and am lucky enough to have a mainline Waterloo/ Weymouth rail network ..

    People need to commute either to college, or job or even hospital appointments or even for a shopping trip .

    Season tickets cost a fortune . A real fortune to someone on a low salary . Car travel, share and care is onerous because the volume of rush hour traffic means that a half hour trip can suddenly become over an hour , but £15 rail return to Bournemouth .. dreadful .

    No wonder some people prefer to be on benefits.

  31. Good morrow Gentlefolk. Sad to say, while there are more stories, they will be only published very sporadically. I'm too exhausted these days to do it on a daily basis.

    1. Take care, Tom – just post your thoughts when you can, as the rest of us do. Don't tire yourself out.

    2. Good morning Tom ,

      As long as you just say hello and let us know how you are doing is all that matters.

      Don't allow glumness to get you down , please..

    3. Fact is that it is hard to keep up, it is becoming a full time job keeping track of all the iniquities of this regime.

      2. Try this, then, Paul:

        Good morrow, Gentlefolk, today’s (recycled) story

        You Bet

        A deaf-mute walks into the chemist to buy some condoms. He has difficulty communicating with the pharmacist and cannot see condoms on the shelf.

        Frustrated, he finally unzips his pants, places his dick on the counter and puts down a five pound note next to it.

        The pharmacist looks at it, smacks down another five pounds, unzips his pants, lays his penis across from the deaf mute's member, then picks up both notes and stuffs them in his pocket.

        Exasperated, the deaf mute begins to curse the pharmacist wildly in sign language.

        "Look," the pharmacist says, "if you can't afford to lose, you shouldn't bet."

    8. Leave it for quite a long time so you may recover a bit.
      We're all getting old and forgetful, so that when you return most of them will seem new.

      Good luck

  32. Morning all 🙂😊
    Lovely sunny start and less wind, no rain as forecast.
    We are out to lunch later with a friend from Melbourne over visiting her family. She lives very close to where the TV series neighbours was filmed.
    I thought things couldn't get any worse than it was under the tory morons, but this lot are the devil in disguise, …….oh yes they are.
    Robbing the poor infirm elderly to pay, by comparison the already wealthy union members. 50 thousand plus per year to live on can't be bad, for sitting down on a train all day.
    I expect things will only get worse under the latest idiots in Wastemonster.

      1. From Reed http://www.reed.com/articles/train-driver-salary-benefits

        While each train company offers slightly different salaries, it’s important to be aware of the pay scales and benefits that every rail company offers across the country. To help you navigate this, here is a helpful guide to average UK train driver salary and benefits.

        Average train driver salary ranges
        The salary and benefits packages for the role of a train driver usually depends on the company, alongside external factors such as length of service, location, and qualifications.

        The average train driver salary in the UK is £48,500 per year. Train drivers can expect to begin with an average starting salary of £30,000, with the highest salaries often exceeding £65,000.

        Train driver salaries can also differ between commercial or freight roles. The average freight train driver salary in the UK is £44,418.

        The average train driver salary in London is £58,795, with experienced professionals in the region having salaries that often exceed £69,000, while train driver salaries in Scotland start at £38,194 for newly qualified drivers, rising to £48,360 after the probation period has ended.

        The average annual salary range for some company-specific train driver roles are:

        London North Eastern Railway (LNER)

        The average LNER train driver salary range is £30,000 to £70,000.

        Transport for London (TfL)

        The average TFL train driver salary range is £57,217 to £61,620.

        Scotrail

        The average Scotrail train driver salary range is £50,659 to £56,245.

        Northern Rail

        The average Northern Rail train driver salary range is £40,104 to £57,546.

        East Midlands Railway

        The average East Midlands Railway train driver salary range is £54,403 to £61,467.

        Great Western Railway

        The average Great Western Railway train driver salary range is £49,807 to £67,304.

        Merseyrail

        The average Merseyrail train driver salary range is £50,572 to £55,415.

        Southeastern Railway

        The average Southeastern Railway train driver salary range is £37,261 to £58,503.

        How train driver salaries compare to other specialisms
        Other specialist roles within the same sector as train drivers include bus and taxi drivers, train conductors and airline pilots.

        The average annual salaries for these specialist roles are:

        Bus driver

        The average salary for a bus driver in the UK is £24,077.

        Taxi driver

        The average salary for a taxi driver in the UK is £27,509.

        Train conductor

        The average salary for a train conductor in the UK is £30,687.

        Airline pilot

        The average salary for a commercial airline pilot in the UK is £61,250.

        Roles and responsibilities
        Train drivers are expected to understand the routes and trains they are driving, the signalling systems in place along their route, alongside any rail safety regulations and emergency procedures that may need to be used throughout their shift. Shifts usually range from around six to 11 hours and vary from company to company.

        On a day-to-day basis, typical tasks undertaken by train drivers include:

        Checking engine performance and the general state of the train prior to each journey

        If running a freight train, ensuring that the correct freight is loaded

        Ensuring that the route is known and agreed with the control centre

        Examining any problems which are currently affecting the route

        Understanding the current track and weather conditions

        Following signal instructions and safety regulations

        Making announcements to passengers, as well as opening the automatic doors for passengers when arriving at stations

        Alerting the driver taking over duty about any incidents or engine issues the train has

        Keeping a written record of any problems and delays which may occur while on duty

        ************************************

        The moral of this story is don't become an airline pilot, especially when you consider the role's responsibilities

      1. There should be none because a blasphemy law that covered all faiths would exclude valid complaints about Islam as a political movement.

      2. There MUST NEVER be a blasphemy law. If a religion cannot tolerate criticism, then it's not much good.

      3. NO! There should be NO blasphemy law at all. It's the thin end of the wedge and will end up with islam using it to shut down any debate.

    2. I think I'm going to require a ready to go jail pack. It's going to be complicated what with a bag of drugs, my oxygen, CPAP machine, dietary requirements, specific type of bed, etc, etc. May I be a monumental pain in their arse with all that and my mouth.

    3. I don't know why people keep saying asking why Christianity doesn't get equal treatment. It has the advantage of having God to protect it.

        1. Good morning. I hope you are feeling better today.

          If you want to see the party pics they were posted on Monday and Tuesday.

          2. I saw some snaps of what looked like an outing from an old people’s home!!! Well done you for hosting it.

          3. Thank you.

            Not only was i the host with the most but i was also the youngest.

            The 'pushy nurse' was here too. A journey i would only contemplate by helicopter.

  34. Good Morning all. A pleasant day weatherwise, sunny but not to hot. I trust all are well?

    Today a poll from GB News instead of a video to start.

    SHOCK POLL: Not even half of Britons feel proud Britain is a multi-ethnic society…
    The United Kingdom is an ethically diverse country as people from across the globe have settled in Britain for generations bringing with them their own cultures such as cuisine, sport, music and religion.

    While some see Britain's multiculturalism as an aspect of 'Britishness', others have mixed feelings about Britain as a multi-ethnic society and don't see it as something to be "proud" of.

    According to a new More in Common poll, 48 per cent of respondents say they are proud that Britain is a multi-ethnic society.

    Meanwhile, 45 per cent are indifferent stating they are neither proud nor ashamed of Britain's ethically diverse society and seven per cent say they are ashamed.

    These figures differ by voting groups with 23 per cent of Reform UK voters being ashamed to be in a multi-ethnic society and 10 per cent of Conservative voters.
    Labour (68%), Liberal Democrats (63%) and Green voters (65%) are most likely to say they are proud of Britain's multi-ethnic society while only 20 per cent of Reform voters and 39 per cent of conservatives say the same.

    The results also differ greatly by age with younger people far more likely to say they are proud than older generations.

    Some 68 per cent of 18 to 24-year-olds are proud of Britain's multiculturalism which slowly decreases amongst each age group with only 30 per cent of over 75-year-olds saying the same.

    The 45 to 54 age category are the most likely to say they are ashamed at 11 per cent.

    The results also differ by region with respondents in London, one of the most multicultural cities in the world, most likely to be proud (66%).

    Across the rest of the UK, the results ranged between 40 and 50 per cent with the exceptions of South West England (37%) and West Midlands (56%) saying they are proud.

    The poll was conducted from August 5 to 7 in the aftermath of anti-immigration protests and violent riots that swept parts of the UK.

    Thousands of people took to the streets to protest over immigration and fraying public services with some using the opportunity of unrest to act violently.

    Political commentator Matt Goodwin blamed the "elites" for the riots by "ushering in policies like hyper-globalisation, mass immigration, and deindustrialisation."

    Goodwin continued: "Farage, furthermore, is also tapping into other issues that he did not create but which the elite class has managed disastrously, like multiculturalism.

    "Indeed, more than than three-quarters of the people who voted for Farage last month, 78 per cent, think multiculturalism is making life in Britain worse, not better… this is not exactly a ringing endorsement of a policy that is pushing people apart, not bringing them together."

    1. True Brits like most of us , could ask the National Trust to take care of us , we will be protected , regarded as historical remnants of an older Britain , our own culture , our food, our language , our birthright , our religion , prayers , hymns , country songs , Christian names , rural Britain , crafts and our villages should be protected and our industrial heritage should be applauded and remembered .

      Make our country a time walk again , we are an island for goodness sake , our parents protected it during WW2, we don't need more migrants imported to look after the migrants that are already here , we don't require another culture dictating our laws .. and our humour , sharpness, and security .. we just want to be left alone .

      Now look at this bit of nonsense below.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humour_in_Islam

      1. From that page:

        "Humour in Islam refers to the act of doing things that are considered humorous under the guidelines set by the Quran and the Islamic prophet Muhammad."

        Humour then, an act licensed by Muhammad and subject to approval. A but like Have I Got News For You and the Edinburgh Fringe, then.

          3. We suspect that this will be construed as insulting to Moslems at prayer.

            Soon there will be a knock at your door.

      2. Good Morning Belle! Needless to say I agree with you. Somehow we have to go on the attack, not feel defeated. We should remember that for two years we stood alone against the Germans in WWII. I belong to the generation after that and so do you. Others here are the same. We have not forgotten true England, we were not born into a Britain of lies. We know that there is an English culture and that we have a right to it just as any other culture has a right to theirs. We need to speak up, not just here, but in forums and situations that are out of our zone of security and speak Truth to power.

    2. Indeed.
      When I was younger and still lived in the UK, there was almost no stabbings, and particularly not random ones. Now, UK is so enriched that it happens so often they cannot be bothered to report or investigate. Yaay for multiculturalism.
      BTW, it's beginning now in Norway, too, the stabby-stabby. But we're rapidly filling up with wogs who are utterly useless, too.

      1. I remember. I remember when a single murder was so unusual that it would make front page headlines of the National Newspapers apart from The Times, the front page was all advertising. I even remember that the Daily Mail was a reputable Conservative Newspaper. Now look at it. A gossipy scandal mongering heap of trash.

    1. So it's not a crime to enter another country illegally, now it's just an irregularity. Nice to know for future travels.

  37. That's the useful crap dealt with.
    Sorted the cut grass to a heap in (my) part of the woods, and tidied the garden shed. Not only can you see the floor (!), but you can move around in it, as well. Achieved by putting the garden chairs with their back to the wall, not halfway out in the middle, and stacking spare tiles underneath them, then the car-related chemicals and tyre chains in suddenly-revealed space in the shelf!
    Yaay! Time for a coffee as reward!

  38. Hi Nottlers. To digress from more serious matters. I’m currently reading a series of books by Steven Saylor about Gordianus the Finder; a Roman private detective. These are set in the last days of the Republic. Roughly Sulla to Caesar. Gordianus finds himself involved with all of them at various stages in his life. They are quite impressive simply as that but the detail of Roman life adds to it. The oddity is that when Saylor wrote them the “West” was still the West, the Common Market was concerned with Wine Lakes and Butter Mountains and the UK was still a monocultural Democracy. The changes over the last thirty years have added an extra layer to Saylor’s narrative, the corruption, the double dealing, the difficulties of living in a collapsing society are all given added force. Recommended by Minty.

    2. Excellent books. Read them years ago. Sort of Falco for grownups (though there is nothing wrong with Falco).

    1. "you did not want your money going to immigrants who rape our kids and get priority" has two possible meanings.
      (a) he doesn't want his money going to people who happen to be immigrants who rape kids and get unfair priority
      (b) he doesn't want his money going to immigrants because all immigrants are rapists who get unfair priority.

      The judge does seem to have taken the meaning as (b) but it's pretty clear to me that (a) was intended and is a fair comment. Did these people have no legal defence? I suppose the cases were pushed through so quickly that they had no time to organise one.

    2. So if Silent Prayer is banned, does that mean simply standing in silent contemplation is perfectly legal provided one is not thinking of the Almighty?

      1. Um.. basically yes. Thoughts are dangerous, remember. Labour for one just doesn't approve of unauthorised thinking. Apparently prayer in "safe zones" is now too big to contain. It could lead to a Chernobyl-level event if allowed to continue and public safety must be the government's priority.

        It's all a balance of hoooman rites, m'kay.

        1. BBC reported a couple of days ago that a man has been arrested in Lincolnshire

          for amongst other things ‘antiestablishment rhetoric’.

          Be careful if you want to do unauthorised thinking James.

          1. I did read having seen your post Janet, that he’d also spread some comments that others are being picked up for, to do with the riots. Whether I agree with that or not is beside the point, since it is at least consistent.

            The worrying thing is the “ant-establishment rhetoric”. There is no offence that I’m aware of along these lines and the nearest thing to it might be say, the old “sedition” laws. Are we really going back to that?

          2. Best to stick with murder, rape and theft. That seems to be OK. Especially if you remembe to praise Alan's snackbar.

      2. The Police will have the final say in whether your silent contemplation included the Almighty or not.

        However contemplating a bacon sarnie could well be a contributory factor to your prosecution.

        1. They've thought about that.

          The DPP has just announced that anyone in receipt of unlawful communications published by means of prayer mustn't think they're in the clear. Arrest warrants know no borders and just because you live in a mansion behind pearly gates in a foreign country does not mean you're out of the reach of PC Rowley, The People's Peeler.

          1. I'm waiting for Rowley and Co. to rock up at the Pearly Gates to arrest the Big Chap.
            Will they pin St. Peter to the cloud if he dares to impede their progress?

          2. I think they probably will. I imagine though, what with the many examples we read about these days to do with insensitive policing that they’ll completely fail to understand when he insists on being pinned to the cloud upside down. Probably get resisting arrest added to the charge sheet for his insolence.

      3. The Police will have the final say in whether your silent contemplation included the Almighty or not.

        However contemplating a bacon sarnie could well be a contributory factor to your prosecution.

      4. 391685+ up ticks,

        Morning Bob,
        One would need a good honest
        lawyer / judge on ones side, to fight ones corner, and you have more chance of hearing a unicorn breaking wind than finding one of them.

      5. I think that a two tier prayer system will be introduced.

        If you want to pray silently and legally in public you will be obliged to put a mat on the pavement or road, get down on your knees, put your face on the ground and your bottom in the air.

      6. I think that a two tier prayer system will be introduced.

        If you want to pray silently and legally in public you will be obliged to get down on your knees on a mat, put your face on the ground and your bottom in the air.

  42. Good morning, all. Back in the land of the living, at last. Thanks to a miracle French drug "nifuroxazide". When I bought them, they were available over the counter: now, maddeningly, one needs a prescription. They are not available in the UK. They kill the bacteria that are causing the gastroenteritis. It is not an experience I intend to repeat. The great mystery is when the bug came from. The MR and I eat the same food. I had not been in contact with anyone else since the previous Sunday. Anyway – many thanks for your many kind messages.

    To those who asked, Loperamide had no effect at all. It is a stopper-upper – ideal if one simply has the runs but useless for a bacterial attack.

    I hope none of you are now languishing in prison for several years. I had virtually no contact with t'internet during the eight days I was incapacitated – but I did see the paper and noted that sending a tweet (FFS) saying "burn down a mosque" gets you 15 months, but marching, masked, shouting "death to jews, death to infidels" is an example of peaceful free speech.

    What strange times we live in.

    I intend to say nothing about the nightmare that surrounds us. I can do nothing about t; no one in charge cares a hoot what I think or feel (apart from the hate police, of course). So my sporadic comments will be limited to one-liners, fish puns and cat stories. (I realise that that discriminates against dogs…) G & P were completely indifferent to my illness!

    I shall now go and enjoy my first cup of coffee in over a week and then – what larks – hang out the washing.

    2. Good to know that you've defeated the lurgy. Unhelpfully Our NHS only consider the runs to be a problem if it goes on continuously for a fortnight. Morphine is the best bung but as you say, it doesn't get at the cause. Did G & P at least keep you company?

      1. The three days I was in bed, Gus would spend the morning curled at my feet – occasionally biting them. Pickles – who? !!

      3. Yo Sue.

        They did the reverse for me.

        Exhaust valve malfunctioning.

        Two types of chemical lubricant to be ingested Twice Daily…..

    3. Bill, I am so pleased that you are now in much better health. My best wishes to you and the MR, not forgetting G and P.

    6. Don't know about cats, but dogs really relish having an invalid around the house.
      More specifically, an invalid tucked up in a nice comfy bed ….. in need of solace that only dogs can provide; if they can be Rsed to stay awake for long enough.

      1. Many cats – including some of those who are generally aloof – make excellent nurses. Warm, purring pillows of solace in those aching and miserable hours.

    7. I had not been in contact with anyone else since the previous Sunday.

      Well there you have it.
      Allah punished you for attending church. Did you take communion? If so, that's how he got you.

      1. Ho ho. Sat at least six feet away from any of the four other congregants. No touching. No singing. It was Evensong.

    10. …what on the Siegfried Line?

      Glad you have recovered … I was even worried enough to enquire after you a few days ago….

  44. Hallo Bill. Was wondering where you were. Thought, maybe, you had enough and had decided to go. So I'm really pleased to see you back, as I'm sure, everyone else is. Sorry about the illness but, obviously good that you are recovering.

    This is not a cure but a preventative. Someone with IBS recommended them because I have constant problems, I think caused by all the drugs I take, so far to my surprise, because I tend to think such things are nonsense they have worked extremely well. You might want to try them, this specific brand.
    Nutrizing Bio Cultures Complex Probiotics for Gut Health – High Strength 30 Bill
    https://www.bestspy.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/NutriZing-Bio-Cultures-Complex-768×768.jpg

  45. Only the Monarch & Military left, said David Starkey. Then along comes the Ginger Dopey..
    Prince Harry takes swipe at Elon Musk after Southport riots..

    Whinge & Ginge should take note at what happened in Hong Kong in Sept 2022.

    The British Consulate-General in Hong Kong, extended the opening hours of the book of condolences to meet demand.
    Mr Wong, a market stall trader, had one thing to say of the day that Britain’s late Queen Elizabeth II visited a Hong Kong public housing estate in 1975: “We didn’t sell many vegetables that day.”

    Perhaps, your grandma knew the difference between real freedom.. and the tyranny of the commie-woo-woo liberalism.

    1. A clever guy observed..

      “We know that they are lying, they know that they are lying, they even know that we know they are lying, we also know that they know we know they are lying too, they of course know that we certainly know they know we know they are lying too as well, but they are still lying. In our country, the lie has become not just moral category, but the pillar industry of this country.”

      And what happened to Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn? He was arrested and imprisoned for being a "model citizen."

      1. and only then did Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn start to fight back..

        A long long long way to go.

    2. The full text of the tweet:
      "I’ve been thinking about this a lot over the last few weeks.
      I’ve seen people I know—some I consider friends—arrested and charged simply for stating their opinions on social media.
      Here are a few conclusions I’ve come to:

      1. Those in power are terrified of people who speak the truth.
      They’ve employed every mechanism within the political, media, and judicial systems to demonise and punish these individuals—not because of what they did or said, but because their words and actions directly challenged the direction those in power are trying to take.
      The people in power have a specific agenda, and over the last year, they’ve been losing their grip on the population.
      Fewer people are paying attention to mainstream media (MSM) and the usual messaging, and more are turning to social media and citizen journalism for information that truly matters to them.
      These individuals were made into public examples—punished to serve as a warning to anyone else who might dare to question authority.
      The goal was to regain control, and they may believe they’ve succeeded.

      2.Those arrested and charged have often received extremely poor legal advice.
      Many have pleaded guilty, likely out of fear that a guilty verdict in a higher court would result in a much harsher sentence.
      Others may have felt they couldn’t afford the financial burden of defending themselves in open court.
      The absurd, overreaching show trials we’ve witnessed, ending in outrageous sentences, might never have happened if people had a) understood the law better, and b) had the means to mount a proper defense.
      Justice is supposed to be decided by 12 jurors who weigh the evidence and reach a verdict.
      In most cases, the charges would likely have been dismissed.
      Believe it or not, our jury system works. That’s why they don’t want you to access it.

      3.This government is attempting to terrify the population into silence through outrageous show trials and ridiculous punitive sentencing.
      It might work for a very short time, but the festering resentment caused by the government’s refusal to address the fundamental issues driving the spiralling decline in community cohesion is only growing stronger.
      In fact, these issues are being completely ignored.
      The lack of control over immigration is putting immense strain on our society.
      You can’t negotiate for a better standard of living if thousands are coming into the country willing to work for your wage or lower.
      It’s a race to poverty, where only the global profiteers win.
      Two-tier justice creates animosity, friction, and hatred.
      We must have the same justice for all, irrespective of creed, colour, or religion—otherwise, justice becomes nothing more than a facade for political doctrine.
      As a country, we must be a safe haven for those who are persecuted and provide an opportunity for them to live in a peaceful society.
      We must also welcome those who can enrich, improve, and benefit our society.
      However, this requires a strong defense of our borders, a comprehensive immigration and asylum control system, and a strict process for refusing entry and returning those who attempt illegal entry.

      None of this is happening.

      People are being arrested because they are frustrated that it isn’t happening.

      Yes, we have a few citizens who deserve to be incarcerated.

      But over the last 30 years, it seems we've had far more idiots in parliament

        1. Since Elon took it over there is quite a lot that is useful on there. I was on it for a long time before he took over and I hardly bothered with it. Now I check it every day.

          1. Hmm.. might have to rethink my prejudice against the Twitterati. In other news many of the bien pensant class and self appointed cognoscenti increasingly upset by it. Another good sign.

      3. JFK: "Those who make peaceful protest impossible make violent revolution inevitable."

  48. and only then did Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn start to fight back..

    A long long long way to go.

  49. How curious that Brash and Trash should think the UK "unsafe" but go to war-torn Colombia for a "fact-finding trip"…

    "Colombia's civil conflict, also known as Conflicto armado interno de Colombia, has been ongoing for nearly six decades and is the longest-running and deadliest conflict in Latin America. The conflict has involved the Colombian government, leftist guerrilla groups, right-wing paramilitaries, and organized crime groups. The violence has killed hundreds of thousands of people, displaced millions, and led to the disappearance of tens of thousands.

    What are the major problems in Colombia?
    Significant human rights issues included credible reports of: unlawful or arbitrary killings; torture and arbitrary detention by government security forces and armed groups; serious abuses in a conflict; criminalization of libel; serious government corruption; violence against and forced displacement of Afro-Colombian …"

    Poor lost souls.

    1. Shopping trip; like the Calais booze run.
      Cheaper than getting the marching power delivered by Amazon.
      Are Nectar cards recognised in Bogata?
      p.s. How are you feeling?

      1. 98%, thanks, Annie. Gut OK (see my reference to brilliant French tablets). Body getting less weak, if you see what I mean. For seven days I was weak s weak. Putting on socks meant a five minute rest. But was able to help with the watering last evening.

        1. Ummmm …… you could have rested for longer.
          It persisted down something chronic last night.

          1. We had three hours of very useful rain which droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven.

  51. Good Moaning.
    A fretting MB is torn between two traumas:
    1. He left out the garden bench cushions and they are saturated.
    2. The Poole Harbour ospreys' nest is absolutely sodden.
    Applying my best distraction techniques, I gave him something else to worry about. I made him a bacon roll for breakfast so he can now panic about his imminent demise.

    2. Yo anne,

      I need aid to die too.

      Can my bacon sarnie have brown sauce on it plaease

  52. Prince Harry warns fake online news leads to action on streets after UK riots. 16 August 2024.

    Fake news shared online directly leads to action on the streets, Prince Harry has warned in the wake of riots that swept the country.

    The Duke of Sussex, speaking at an online safety summit in Bogota, Colombia, cautioned that the continual spread of false information via AI and social media meant that social cohesion had “completely broken down”.

    He said: “What happens online within a matter of minutes transfers to the streets. People are acting on information that isn’t true.

    Case proved. Online posting has nothing whatsoever to do with street violence.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2024/08/16/fake-online-news-leads-to-action-on-streets-prince-harry/

    1. Gosh – he is SO well-informed, isn't he?

      If he was making a "big man's speech", why was Trash there? On the look out for a goody-bag of nice new drurgs? Just asking…

        1. Gorm was King of Denmark mid 900s.
          From Wikipedia: Gorm is the reported son of semi-legendary Danish king Harthacnut. Chronicler Adam of Bremen says that Harthacnut came from Northmannia to Denmark and seized power in the early 10th century.[6] He deposed the young king Sigtrygg Gnupasson, reigning over Western Denmark.[3] When Harthacnut died, Gorm ascended the throne.

          Heimskringla reports Gorm taking at least part of the kingdom by force from Gnupa, and Adam himself suggests that the kingdom had been divided prior to Gorm's time. Gorm is first mentioned as the host of Archbishop Unni of Hamburg and Bremen in 936.[6] According to the Jelling Stones, Gorm's son, Harald Bluetooth, "won all of Denmark", so it is speculated that Gorm only ruled Jutland from his seat in Jelling.[6]

          6. Try two-tier Smarmer and his two-tier Stasi and the Judiciary – all as bent as each other.

          7. I must be guilty of thought crime. My brain automatically rearranged the letters for Harthacnut.

    2. Stupid pillock! You'd think with his reputation he'd steer well clear of a drug capital wouldn't you.

    4. I wonder what the net vote gain would be if Trump stated that H would be deported within three months of his taking office, if it was discovered he had lied on his visa application?

      I wonder if M would follow H ?

    5. Back in the days when I worked, we had a distributor in Columbia who sold our software in the region. A lovely chap and we often met during training sessions in Sao Paulo.

      Trouble is since he knew that caffine was my drug of choice, he always came bearing gifts of really nice coffee for me. It led to nervous times on the way home at immigration – honest, it is not coke, it is coffee from Columbia!

  53. My late hound was like that. He’d join one on the bed and then, over the following hours gently push – with his four short but strong legs – the human so far across the bed that one would have to get up and start again….

    1. Beware Johnathan:

      A couple of days ago the BBC reported a man has been arrested in Lincolnshire for amongst

      other things ‘antiestablishment rhetoric’.

      2. Saw that. I don't see how any court would fall for that it's outrageous. If the court does condemn the person on those grounds then there is no reason for us to respect the establishment or anything it has to say. It would make it 100% certain that we do not live in a democracy. At that point what is the regime going to do with people running to embassies and seeking political asylum?

  55. How times have changed. Some of the Danish Embassy demonstrators of 2006 received sentences of 4-6 years for soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred. Expect some Muslim campaigners, once they start researching, to complain of the disparity in sentencing.

    This was the demo where protesters waved placards with slogans such as "Massacre those who insult Islam", "Butcher those who mock Islam", "Be prepared for the real holocaust", "Europe you will pay, your 9/11 is on the way", or "7/7 is on its way"; "Europe you will pay, Bin Laden is on his way", "Freedom go to hell" and "Europe you'll come crawling, when the Mujahideen come roaring". Chubby Choudary, though heavily implicated in the organisation of the protests, was only fined.

    1. Edit for readability.

      Look how long the investigation took, how few were actually arrested and charged and how most were permitted to be bailed.
      Compare what they said/proclaimed/wrote with the current set of protesters.

      On 15 March 2006, five men were arrested and charged for their roles in the protests; one of them was charged and held in custody, two were charged and released on police bail to attend court, and the remaining two were released on police bail for further inquiries. Further arrest were made in the following months and a total of six people have been criminally charged.

      Anjem Choudary, 39, was originally released on bail to return to a police station on 19 April "pending investigations into material recovered in searches". However, he was arrested again on 7 May at Stansted Airport and taken into custody at a London police station. Choudary was charged under the Public Order Act with organising a procession without the required written notification to the police. Choudary was the leader of al Ghurabaa and the "right-hand man of radical Muslim cleric, Omar Bakri Mohammed" who is banned from the UK.[21][22][23][24]

      Abdul Muhid, was also bailed to return to a police station on 19 April after further enquiries. Muhid was arrested with Choudary again on 7 May at Stansted Airport. He was charged with two counts of soliciting to murder. On 7 March 2007 he was found guilty of both charges and later sentenced to six years in jail.[25][26] Muhid is a prominent member of The Saviour Sect and was also arrested in 2005 after complaints that a man had called for British troops in Iraq to be killed and for homosexuals to be hurled from cliff tops, but the charges were dropped by the CPS due to there "not [being] a realistic prospect of conviction" because of problems of proving identity.[21][22][27]

      Mizanur Rahman, was charged with soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred.[23] He was found guilty of inciting racial hatred in December 2006 where the same jury was unable to reach a verdict on the charge of soliciting murder, at a retrial in 2007 he was convicted on the soliciting murder charge as well. Rahman was sentenced to six years in jail.[26][28]

      Umran Javed was charged with soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred and remanded in custody. He was denied bail and not asked to enter a plea.[21][29][30][31] On 5 January 2007, he was found guilty of those charges. He was later sentenced to six years in jail.[26][32]

      Omar Zaheer was charged with racially aggravated disorderly behaviour and disorderly behaviour and released on bail to appear at Bow Street Magistrates' Court on 31 March.[21][29]

      Abdul Rahman Saleem was charged with using words likely to stir up racial hatred and released on bail to appear at West London Magistrates' Court on 31 March.[21][29] On 1 February 2007, he was found guilty, and was later sentenced to four years in jail.[26][33][34]

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Islamist_demonstration_outside_the_Embassy_of_Denmark_in_London

      And also consider the judge in the current circumstances calling for charges where the maximum sentence can be 10 years.

      1. Anjem Choudary – isn't he the chap now Head of Religious Broadcasting at the beeboids? !!!

      2. David Davis was one who was critical of the leisurely approach. We could be generous and say that some in the legal establishment didn't quite know what they were dealing with and just regarded it as a rowdy demonstration but this was the time of Blair. Who knows what he did behind the scenes. Nevertheless, it wasn't riotous in the way that recent demos were.

  56. Four years to go and then I'm 80. I'm still trying to figure out what I'm going to do when I grow up.

    2. #metoo.
      Concluded that work is such a pain in the arse, time to retire.
      But – what will I do? Worked so much these last 35+ years, I have no hobbies, bugger-all outside interests, and, depressingly, no group of friends to socialise with. So… brilliant idea! Applied for a challenging job in a new company, in the line of maintenance / management consulting. That'll give the brain cell a workout! Hoping to hear positive news shortly.

      1. Good luck in your search. You have a friend this side of the N Sea, whenever you wish to pop over. Try Wilhelmsens for a job. I've worked there.

      2. For me it is to carry on doing such things as this. All I used to do I cannot because of physical restraints. But as long as I have my mind and the ability to communicate, it is OK. I’m lucky in as much as my life is lived and has always been lived, in the realm of ideas so I do not feel that constrained. I hope I live into my 90’s actually because there is so much to learn and my time is finite, I wish it were otherwise. I’m also fortunate that I never get bored which is, I suspect, the reason that most people settle in for death, boredom with life. But we live in a beautiful world and although I cannot travel and see it in person. I can at least look at it and enjoy via the internet.

        1. It's not so much boredom with life but more fear of the future under this tyrannical gov't. I don't want to live with it any longer than I have to.

      3. I'm enjoying retirement – so much to do, so little time! If Labour carries on ripping me off at the rate it's started, though, I think I might get a job as a train driver.

  57. Well, there's gratitude. Saw Pickles just now wandering about the road – cars passing every few minutes. Managed to catch him. Took him round the back of the house (which looks on to hundreds of acres without a road for five miles..(sighs). ..) And the bugger quite deliberately BIT me to show his displeasure at being rescued from a likely painful death.

    Though he is very frightened of cars coming slowly into the drive he appears not to connect them with the same things flashing along the road.

    And he (and Gus) are 4 on 16 September…(sighs deeply)….

  58. Right then, weather fine, will clean car then off to lunch at pub with relatives. Be seeing you.

    Don't upset the thought police while I'm away.

  60. 'Morning All
    Lighter side……..
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/191eeacf2dd0d66fcd0d06f53346539176d29fcd7a5d2c8220de4a334e7cccba.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b1b20ecdf33866c808c30501047c1dd5691b8a8a41622a43e4a3ea5aad58588d.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e6e7f51c970efad4ea8e4cdb8fb7b382d99eb3ef28de95f4f484ca1bb8a5b51e.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/13526e9301af43000083784ecab2a330d824e34619661203e596f551d51310bb.jpg
    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/51a5e30eb3714defd5145bfd73f50134504ae0cf374849e36c7d16a914e6a66f.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a2600a80a5bfc58a4a731c030d01fb437a2427791c55a9f2ca98f40e10b0b140.jpg

  61. 'Tourist' is gang-raped for five days after being abducted in Pakistan, before being dumped in the street with hands and legs tied..

    Never under-estimate the naivety of the 'strong independent sassy progressive liberal'.

    Anyhow, why go to Pakistan for some cultural enrichment, when there are plenty of local enrichers ready able and willing at home.. especially in Belgium.
    Though the police in Pakistan, unlike in the UK, have their act together and do their job.

    1. Expect announcement on her TikkyTokky account asserting that Pakistan is a wonderful place & the 'incident' shouldn't reflect badly on their wonderful wonderful people. Here, Ive prepared it already for syndicated release through Reuters.

      She said that she received “absurd comments” that she brought this situation on herself by visiting Pakistan.

      Defending Pakistan, in a post in Dutch, the lady said, “(Pakistan) is a great country and worth visiting. It has its good things and its bad things… And thanks to the police and everyone.”

  62. A pay-per-mile road tax scheme is again being mooted in a move that would meaning those living in remote areas and most reliant on their cars would be stung hardest by the rules.

    There have been growing calls in recent weeks for Chancellor Rachel Reeves to introduce a new road pricing scheme to replace traditional Vehicle Excise Duty (VED).

    The average motorist would likely be hit with costs of £444 a year, while those living in rural parts of the country covering 10,000 miles annually would face bills in the region of £600.

    Supporters of the notion say it would help fill the £22billion black hole in the country's finances. However, the scheme is likely to be met with fierce opposition from those who depend on their cars most.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/cars/article-13746431/Pay-mile-road-tax-introduced-replacing-VED-EV-Switch-October-budget.html?ico=mol_desktop_home

    1. I'm sure that most Labour politicians will be in favour of charging road tax per mile.

      Think of the advantages:

      Another large but self funding Government department who will all vote Labour for evermore

      to retain their jobs.

      Great respect for senior Labour politicians once it is seen that well paid senior departmental

      positions are within their gift.

      No cost to politicians and senior civil servants who will obviously be using Government cars to get around.

      I think that it is a great idea !

    3. That will stop us from travelling 40 miles a week to pick up our grandchild from school.

    4. As someone pointed out elsewhere.
      We already pay such a tax, it's in the form of fuel duties.

    5. But the biggest problem at the moment is that there appears to be no way to "oppose". All avenues are being closed.

    6. I wonder why there's a black hole in the finances? Couldn't possibly have anything to do with housing loads of non-working immigrants in hotels and giving them benefits,, could it?

  63. Here's one for a lovely town on the west coast of Ireland, population 80,000.. soon to be doubled.

    Army Priest stabbed multiple times outside Renmore Army Barracks, Galway.

    1. You see.. Starmergeddon is working a treat.
      Lidderally, no one is speculating the ethnicity of the stabby.

      And if you happen to "see" a stabby incident.. immediately "Look Away.." otherwise you'll get time in jail for "being".

    2. The chaplain was approached by a youth outside the barracks. The chaplain then ran through the barracks gate and was followed by the youth. The teen, a male youth who is understood to be 16, was restrained by members of the Defence Forces.

      How very convenient.
      Do they know or are they guessing his age, and if they are having to guess, why might that be?

      1. A friend of mine, Peter Crowther, used to run a pub in Weymouth called The Sailor's Return.

        He holds the record for the OSTAR (Observer Singlehanded Transatlantic Race). His boat, The Golden Vanity, took the longest time ever to complete the race.

        Before the start in Plymouth Peter's cat jumped ship for about half and hour. In mid-Atlantic she gave birth to a litter of kittens.

        https://www.classicboat.co.uk/news/slowest-ostar-sailor-return/

        2. Yep. Been there. Actually i have been to all the Weymouth Pubs. Uncles finding things for us to do.

    3. Weston super Mare's donkeys are under threat; people are trying to ban them. I used to ride the donkeys at Weston super Mud when I was a tot.

  65. The bastards really are out to silence everyone who doesn't agree with what is being done to the UK.
    Damn them all to Hell.

    Man, 32, becomes first adult to be charged with the higher punishable offence of riot over UK disorder as CPS warn 'more will be coming'

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13750171/Man-32-adult-charged-higher-punishable-offence-riot-UK-disorder-CPS-warn-coming.html

    I very, very much doubt it will happen, but a senior judge needs to stand up and say that these Salem witch trials are out of all proportion to the reality of the offences.

      2. Excellent comment. I think they've pushed things through quickly so that people had no time to organise a defence. I also think they picked on people who would be overwhelmed by the whole experience. No lawyers, Oxbridge graduates etc – that doesn't fit the story they were trying to place in the media.
        It is a slight red flag to me that KH doesn#t seem to think that Tommy R is controlled opposition. It seems pretty obvious to me that Laurence Fox and Tommy Robinson are the controlled opposition to steer various different groups of native Britons in the direction the authorities want them to go. Both were encouraging the protests. No doubt there are equivalent muslim figures.

  67. Ukrainian civilians urged to evacuate Pokrovsk as Russian troops approach

    Military authorities in the eastern Ukrainian town of Pokrovsk have urged civilians to speed up their evacuation because the Russian army is quickly closing in on what has for months been one of Moscow’s key targets.

    The call for people to get out as soon as possible came as Kyiv’s forces are trying to divert the Kremlin’s military focus to Russian soil by launching a bold incursion across the border into the Kursk region.

    Lol. The Telegraph still has six articles up saying that the Russians are finished.

    https://www.irishnews.com/news/world/ukrainian-civilians-urged-to-evacuate-pokrovsk-as-russian-troops-approach-FZ2UXZAD2JJWNF7YNJDIGFZXJE/

        1. Went to the offices there a few times, and a couple of times for swim tests but never saw the residential areas. Looking pretty nice.

  69. I was shopping with my neighbour, Karen. We had a basket each and were were putting items onto the conveyor when the Lass on the till apologised but said she was closing.

    As i was behind Karen i dumped my stuff back in the basket. Looked over my shoulder and saw another lass on that till looking over. She obviously saw what had happened. So i went to her and Karen followed. So i was in front this time.

    The young Lass said sorry for the inconvenience and said the first item i put through would be free.

    Wahey. Litre bottle of Grants !

    The look on Karen's face was priceless.

    Happy days.

          1. I don’t drink that stuff. That’s for posh guests. I drink Bells, Teachers or Grants…with Coca cola.
            Chav that i am.

  70. From Coffee House. the Spectator

    Can Keir cope with Kamala?
    Comments Share 16 August 2024, 12:05pm
    After a year of speculation about how Keir Starmer would work with Donald Trump, the situation stateside has changed dramatically. Gone is the flailing Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential candidate; in his place is Kamala Harris, his resurgent vice president. She enters her party’s national convention as the bookmakers’ favourite to win the White House, with polls suggesting she has a slim lead over Trump. The change in momentum is privately welcomed by most Labour ministers, who would prefer working with a president who hails from their sister party across the pond. Both Starmer and Harris share a legal background and face shared challenges on crime, migration, and unorthodox opponents. Yet while a Democratic victory is the preferred choice of much of Whitehall, it may be hard for Starmer’s team to forge the kind of close bonds which other premiers and presidents have shared in the past.

    The next three months will be a difficult balancing act for the British government. As Foreign Secretary, David Lammy has been keen to present himself as a pragmatist. He boasted last month of his ‘common ground’ with J.D. Vance, declaring ‘We will work with whomever the United States choose to put in the White House.’ Such talk is understandable, given the urgent need to build ties with Trump after the posturing of Lammy and others during the Corbyn years. Yet the risk is that in doing so, Lammy could alienate and irritate Harris’s team. Her campaign is invested in depicting Trump and Vance as extreme, unstable and simply ‘weird’. Any moves to normalise Trump will go down badly with the Democrats, who are extremely sensitive about any sense that US allies are preparing for life with Trump.

    There is a warning here from 1992 – the last time a presidential contest and a general election fell in the same year. John Major won re-election that April but his fellow conservative George HW Bush lost to underdog Bill Clinton seven months later. The lasting suspicion in some Democrat circles was that Major’s team had been overtly rooting for Bush’s victory. Two Tory panjandrums advised Bush’s team to focus their attacks on Clinton’s character, while the Home Office became embroiled in a row over whether Clinton was a Vietnam ‘draft dodger’. There is no suggestion that Labour will do anything as overt this time around. But it is a reminder of the risks facing Lammy and the Foreign Office as they try to keep both camps onside in the 80 days left before America heads to the polls.

    Should Harris win on 5 November, Britain will likely feature less in Harris’s worldview than under Biden. While the President’s team closely followed the debates on the Northern Ireland Protocol, his VP has a much less Eurocentric perspective. She has less experience, exposure and affinity to Europe. Biden is East Coast; Harris is West. He makes much of his Irish ancestry; her heritage is Indian and Jamaican. He is a lifelong foreign policy guy, chairing the Senate’s prestigious committee; she has little experience here and few experts of her own. Her function throughout much of 2022 and 2023 has been Biden’s ‘surrogate’ on the international stage. At last year’s Munich Security Conference, she was, according to one member of the British delegation, the ‘single least impressive leader’ who met with Rishi Sunak. On Europe, ‘she’s simply not interested’, says another Whitehall veteran.

    This does not mean of course that Starmer and his team have nothing to offer Harris. To take one recent example, the UK will inevitably be drawn into the transatlantic debate about social media and Elon Musk’s ownership of X – a subject the Vice President takes a keen interest in. But it would be naive to suggest that a Harris victory guarantees Starmer a close relationship with the most powerful officeholder in the western world.

      1. She has achieved a big fat nothing. That's why she is avoiding the press. That and the fact that she is as thick as …

      2. She has achieved a big fat nothing. That's why she is avoiding the press. That and the fact that she is as thick as …

    2. If you recall. I said a couple of months ago that it was a mistake for Trump to point out that Biden was senile. He should have waited a lot longer before putting the cat amongst the pigeons. Now the Democrats have had time to engineer the disaster of Harris as the next President. If she wins we can all give up and go home, metaphorically speaking, because America will go, very quickly down the same road as we are on. However, it will be a disaster for the whole of the West, not just a mess for one country.

  71. Train drivers to strike every weekend for next three months despite bumper pay rise
    Members of Aslef union to start fresh campaign at LNER
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/16/train-drivers-strike-pay-rise/

    "The Aslef trade union is going to strike every weekend for three months, days after securing a 14 per cent pay rise from the Government. Members of the train drivers’ union are starting a fresh campaign of strikes at LNER between the end of August and November."

    What a world.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ptqhjyykW0

  73. from Coffee House, the Spectator

    Why there is no two-tier policing in France
    Comments Share 16 August 2024, 7:19am
    The phrase ‘without fear or favour’ has been much in the news of late. Whether the maxim is still applicable to the British constabulary is a matter of conjecture. Some, like the ex-policeman Harry Miller, have been saying for years that the police ‘have traded impartiality for the praise of special interest groups’. Miller was visited by Humberside police in January 2020 after he expressed gender-critical views in an online poem. He later won a legal challenge against the police.

    There is a refreshing no-nonsense approach to French policing
    Others insist that the police remain impartial. Interviewed during the recent anti-immigration riots in England, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper rejected the idea of ‘two-tier policing’, saying they operate ‘without fear or favour, whatever the kinds of crimes it is that they face.’

    Harry Miller might challenge that view, as might the teacher from Batley Grammar school. He remains in hiding more than three years after an Islamist mob gathered outside his place of work after he showed a caricature of the Prophet during a discussion about free speech.

    When Dame Sara Khan published her report into the incident earlier this year, she was highly critical of the police, saying there ‘was a lack of public robust messaging that made clear that any threatening, harassing or intimidatory behaviour against the RS teacher and other teaching staff would not be tolerated.’

    A month after Miller was told by the police to check his thinking, I wrote a piece for Coffee House entitled ‘British police must learn from France in dealing with Extinction Rebellion’. Like many other Britons, I had watched the television in disbelief as police in Cambridgeshire stood idly by while climate change yobs dug up Trinity College’s ancient lawn.

    Most popular
    Ross Clark
    What should Starmer do about monkeypox?

    On the subject of Trinity College, has anyone been arrested in connection with the criminal damage inflicted on the portrait of Arthur Balfour earlier this year? A woman from Palestine Action was filmed slashing the portrait at Trinity. Police said they were ‘investigating’ the crime but the case has gone cold, at least in the media.

    Back in 2020 I described the British police as ‘the paramilitary wing of the Guardian’. Nothing has happened since then to change my mind. Meanwhile my admiration for the French forces of law and order continues to grow.

    These are men and women who carry out their duties without fear or favour. There is a reason why the British tradition of glueing yourself to a busy road never took off in France; some environmental activists tried it, but found that they didn’t much like being pepper-sprayed by the impatient police or having their glued hands ripped from the road.

    There is a refreshing no-nonsense approach to French policing. In June I attended a large left-wing rally in Paris, a protest against Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen’s National Rally. The police were out in force, scrutinising protestors as they emerged from the metro at République. I came up the stairs behind a group of young men dressed in black hoodies. One wore a small rucksack. A giant gendarme asked the man to open his rucksack. The man ignored the request, so the gendarme simply ripped the rucksack from the man’s back. There was a squeal of protest. ‘If I tell you to do something, you do it,’ explained the gendarme.

    Some on the French left, notably Jean-Luc Melenchon’s La France Insoumise, accuse the police and the gendarmerie of brutality and racism. Melenchon says they have a ‘shoot to kill’ policy. The police reject the accusations and point to the increasingly violent society that is modern France.

    In 2023 more than 15,000 officers were injured in the line of duty and nine lost their lives. A minority on the left mock the dead. ‘One dead cop = one vote fewer for the NR [Marine Le Pen’s National Rally]’ is a taunt seen sometimes on placards at left-wing demos. Asked about it in June, Melenchon brushed the jibe aside, saying ‘we have the right to laugh, don’t we?’

    It is estimated that between 50 and 60 per cent of the police and gendarmerie vote for Le Pen or Eric Zemmour. Their political views don’t appear to influence their conduct. When a far-right mob arrived in the southern town of Romans-sur-Isère last November in search of a fight, the police were quickly on the scene to disperse them.

    A few weeks later police and gendarmes in riot gear confronted a large convoy of tractors on their way to Paris to protest about the crisis in the farming industry. One police union admitted that they sympathised with the plight of the farmers but that would not affect how they dealt with anyone ‘who got out of hand’.

    Some did go too far in their protest, breaking into a storage area at Rungis market south of Paris. Police arrested 79 protesters, some of whom belonged to the right-wing farmers’ union, Coordination rurale. Their spokeswoman accused the police of overreacting.

    The police didn’t overreact, they were doing their job, without fear or favour.

        1. I have deleted it, Tom – but next time the MR is at her desk, I'll ask her if she still has it.

    4. what can you say..? yeah, what can you say?

      I hope they are coming to place near me.
      Gosh, some more arrived by boat today.. that's good. No really. That's great.
      Let's not go anywhere near the local mosque.. because that's rude.. in any case why mention a mosque?

    5. I understood they fired warning shots rather than shot at him.
      He was "subdued" and disarmed.

      Naturally, I will be much happier if turns out he was shot

  78. IT is sunny – though fresh – out, so I shall do some gentle gardening. Family visiting tomorrow – so MR is, er, making sure all is neat and tidy…
    Back later.

  79. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/16/two-teenagers-charged-over-extreme-right-wing-terrorism/

    This is pure thought crime. It was always obvious that the 'terrorism' laws were designed to first protect musim errorists and then to silence discussion and debate over the massive, unwanted dangerous flood of immigrants into this country.

    I hate what the Left have done to the UK. It must be undone. It'll take more than a decade and see the civil service put through a blender, but it must be done.

    1. Are errorists those who practice errorism and thereby attempt to errify people?

      Or are they simply just practitioners of mistakes?😉

    3. Rex Clark, 18, of Ilford, east London, has been charged with preparation of terrorist acts, contrary to Section 5 of the Terrorism Act (TACT) 2006.

      Sofija Vinogradova, 19, of Cheshunt, has been charged with preparation of terrorist acts and two counts of collection of information likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism.

      The head of the Met's Counter Terrorism Command, Commander Dominic Murphy, said: "These are extremely serious charges but I would urge the public not to speculate any further about this case at this time and allow the criminal justice process to run its course unimpeded.

      "While we are not able to comment in any detail about the investigation now that these charges have been brought, I want to reassure the public that at this time we do not believe that there is any wider threat related to this investigation, although our investigation very much continues.

      "I also want to make clear that our investigation into this matter is not as a consequence of the disorder across the country which occurred following the terrible events in Southport."

      'Preparation of an act' is an interesting term. It covers many bases, as they say. Perhaps they were going to spray insulting messages on a mosque, or drop leaflets with passages from the Bible all over West Bradford. Of course, given that Ms Vinogradova obviously sounds a bit Russian, I expect Vlad will be mentioned soon as people begin to speculate, which they will undoubtedly do, Commander Murphy.

      And why is it right-wing? From which 'wing' came the murder of 80+ UK citizens by Muslims from 2005 onwards?

      3. Why do they even say ‘but I would urge the public not to speculate any further about this case at this time and allow the criminal justice process to run its course unimpeded.’ Of course we’re going to speculate.

    5. It has not helped having a left wing Conservative Party and left wing prime minsters since 2010 – Cameron, May, Johnson and Sunak.

      Johnson pretended to be right wing but the truth was that he was just as left as the others. And of course as soon as Truss started making right of centre noises they got rid of her.

        1. “Thirty-five is a very attractive age. London society is full of women of the very highest birth who have, of their own free choice, remained thirty-five for years.”

          ― Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest

          Under 18 and identity withheld until the outcry dies down. Some stabbers may choose to remain 17 for years.

    2. Hope Father Murphy pulls through OK.
      Pity the soldiers didn't fatally perforate the 17 YO

  82. When I was a serving police officer (many, many moons ago), people frequently ‘informed’ or ‘advised’ me how to do my job. It was as if they always knew best. They did not know best then, as now, but you can never shut the fuckers up!

    Funny that I never advised teachers how to teach, nurses how to nurse, solicitors how to solicit, dustmen how to empty bins, miners how to dig coal, bakers how to bake, knitters how to knit, sewers how to sew, butchers how to butcher, judges how to judge, reporters how to report, writers how to write, firemen how to squirt water, shopkeepers how to sell, steeplejacks how to climb a ladder, gardeners how to garden, chefs how to cook, mountaineers how to climb a mountain, divers how to dive, astronomers how to skywatch, astrologers how to talk bollocks, sailors how to sail, soldiers how to shoot, pilots how to fly, executioners how to hang, burglars how to burgle, runners how to run, vicars how to preach, swimmers how to swim, presenters how to present, road sweepers how to sweep, those with pretentious-sounding vocations how to do their pretentious-sounding job, singers how to sing, drummers how to drum, skaters how to skate, skiers how to ski, cricketers how to bowl a slow left-arm chinaman, rag-and-bone men how to collect junk, or NoTTLers how to NoTTLe.

    I did, however, often advise drivers how to drive, but that is because most drivers are simply shit at driving and should not be permitted to be in charge of a motor vehicle on the road.

    1. What brought that on, Grizz?
      Most people are better at one's job than onesself. I believe it's a law of the universe. And a severe PITA.

      1. It came from a situation, here right now, involving the report of a 'stolen car' (the car of a friend, who is incapacitated in hospital). Friends and relatives of the owner have reported the car stolen since it was not near where she parked it. It was eventually located in a previously unknown, and quite hidden, car park nearby. It was reported to the police as stolen and treated as such. I visited the site and immediately saw that the car had not been stolen. All the wheels were covered in lots of spider's webs that told me the car had not been moved since it was first parked there.

        The whole silly situation reminded me of the countless times that non-police personnel loudly (and tiresomely) opine how they can do the job better, so that prompted me to make that post.

        Indeed, a severe PITA is precisely what it is, Paul.

        1. Your food could do with a bit more colour. Follow me for more tips.

          >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> runs away fast.

          6. Cappezolli di Venere, an impressive log (must be all that meat), Battenburg and if i am not mistaken….Custard slice !

            What i find absolutely fabulous is how you made your hat out of pastry. Well done you.

          7. The first one is actually Minni di virgini (virgin's tits), a delicacy made on Feb 5 each year in Sicily to commemorate the death of St Agatha, a young teenage girl who had her breasts torn off with pincers and tongs back in the 3rd century AD.

            They are a disc of lemon cake with a dollop of cherry jam,, covered in a crème pat that is topped with chopped pistchios, the whole sweetmeat being wrapped in marzipan, with a glacé cherry as a nipple. They are quite delicious.

            Bottom picture, ⅔. Vanilla slices ✓, Battenberg slices ✓, but you missed the shortbread ✕.

          8. How could i have missed the shortbread!

            ‘The first one is actually Minni di virgini (virgin’s tits)’…..

            Aww Grizz !!!

            Is that category B or C ? Askin’ for my mate who is still serving in Derbyshire.

          10. More by luck than judgment. A very sharp knife and you cut a score in the top flake of pastry first.

          14. I am amazed he allows his missus to grow – wait for it – beans. Quelle contamination…!

    3. You may not have advised singers on how to sing (thank you), but believe me it happens all the time. In the end I realised it was no good discussing anything as that inevitably hurt their misplaced amour propre. I just thanked them and scuttled off as soon as humanly possible.

    4. A policeman friend of mine once told me that a community PC did that job because they liked people, a mounted PC because they liked horses,, a dog handler PC because they loved dogs, a PC became a traffic officer because they hated humanity.
      On a similar note, when I left the army I thought about both police and the fire service, but because I wanted people to like me………the fire service were the lucky ones!!!

      1. Being a traffic officer was never on my agenda. I much preferred feeling the collars of criminals. Catching burglars on the job was the best.

        1. Some years ago there was a policy in the local courts that a burglar would get a three year stretch as a minimum. It stopped being a problem. Obviously this was before the days of Sentencing Guidelines, which has been getting softer at each new issue. In many ways I am sympathetic towards the police, but these days some seem to put the boot into the wrong people which doesn’t help.

    5. A policeman friend of mine once told me that a community PC did that job because they liked people, a mounted PC because they liked horses,, a dog handler PC because they loved dogs, a PC became a traffic officer because they hated humanity.
      On a similar note, when I left the army I thought about both police and the fire service, but because I wanted people to like me………the fire service were the lucky ones!!!

    7. You'd be surprised how many people who'd never done the job knew exactly how to teach and would tell you how to do your job.

    1. That's good. I'm sure you made an excellent host. At a time like this for them they need to be around people that care for them. Don't need to say much. Just be close to each other.

    1. Soon to have severed heads on display once more, Our Susan – after the slammers take over.

      1. Depends on the date of the record you look to for the answer, Grizz. Apparently the favourd explanation now is a corruption of words meaning "what a street!" but that's not what I was taught when growing up in York. Gate is the Norse word Gata of course, meaning street – that's a given – but I was told that whip-ma-whop-ma was exactly what it sounds like. Whipping and whopping.

    3. I used to pass through it, many times, when I lived in Burtonstone Lane and in Acomb (Manor Drive).

    4. When I was stationed in York from 1983-1985, the "Micklegate Run" was a pub crawl from the river Ouse to Micklegate Bar. I failed to complete it despite valiant efforts.

  86. A bit more on the stabbing in Ireland:-

    Teenager arrested after army chaplain injured in 'horrifying' stabbing at Galway barracks
    A TEENAGER HAS been arrested after an army chaplain aged in his 50s was seriously injured in a suspected stabbing at a barracks in Galway last night

    The incident took place at approximately 10.45pm at Renmore Army Barracks when a male youth approached the chaplain and allegedly attacked him.

    Gardaí have said in a statement that one aspect of their investigation is to establish if there was a terror motive in the attack. Their anti-terror investigators the Special Detective Unit are involved in the probe.

    It is understood that gardaí believe the chaplain was in his car entering the barracks when he was approached by the teenager.

    Padre Father Paul F Murphy, who is a member of the clergy attached to the barracks, received a number of stab wounds but it’s believed the injuries are not life-threatening.

    Gardaí have said they are not looking for any one else in connection with the incident and do not believe it is a broader conspiracy.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8e12e284cd64b0dba0e90cbe64702b3e3c1dff54d77f05497cb0606fbeaeaa85.png
    Padre Father Paul Murphy who was seriously injured in a stabbing last night at the Renmore army barracks in Galway.

    He was taken to University Hospital Galway for treatment following the incident.

    In a post on Facebook this morning, the chaplain thanked people for their well-wishes and said he was awaiting surgery for his stab wounds.

    “Friends, thank you for your prayers, love, and concern. Sorry that I can’t reply to all messages and take all the calls coming my way. I’m doing okay; just awaiting surgery,” he said.

    “All will be well,” he added in the post.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/18c13b0ee873a31e8a0fffccd05746f83490e308ab463b4c8eb872af3cb3484c.jpg
    Dún Uí Mhaolíosa, Renmore Barracks in Galway. Brian Walsh

    A spokesperson for Taoiseach Simon Harris said that he has been briefed on the “extremely serious” incident.

    “Our thoughts primarily are with the member of the Defence Forces injured and being treated in hospital.”

    He declined to comment further because of the Garda investigation.

    Tánaiste Micheál Martin condemned the “violent attack” at the Barracks and praised the members of the Defence Forces who were on duty at the time of the attack.

    “I condemn the violent attack at Renmore Barracks last night,” Martin said. “I commend the members of the Defence Forces on duty at the time, whose intervention was critical. Our thoughts are with the Defence Forces member injured in the attack.”

    Serious concern has been expressed by army representative bodies over what they called a “vicious” and “disgusting” assault on the chaplain.

    Warning shots fired
    Personnel fired warning shots to help intervene in the assault, before restraining the teenager. It’s understood that four warning shots were fired.

    A male youth was restrained by members of the Defence Forces and arrested by gardaí at the scene shortly after the incident.

    It’s understood that the teenager is Irish and under the age of 18.

    In a statement, Defence Forces said that shots were fired in “strict accordance with force protection protocols after a Defence Forces member was assaulted” by the teenager.

    It said the soldiers on duty were faced with an “immediate threat” but responded with appropriate force to ensure the safety of those in the area.

    The assailant was quickly detained and handed over to An Garda Síochána, who are now conducting a full investigation into the incident.
    It added that the chaplain was provided with immediate first aid at the scene before being transported to hospital for further treatment. “We can confirm that the victims injuries, while serious, are not life-threatening,” it said.

    The DF statement said that it will continue to “cooperate fully” with the Garda investigation.

    It is understood that the use of force system in the Defence Forces involves warning shots being fired first before moving on to hitting the target – in this instance the suspect surrendered after the warning shots and was restrained.

    Garda investigation
    Gardaí are understood to be investigating statements made at the scene about Irish military involvement in overseas missions uttered by the teenage attacker, according to Garda sources. It is believed that his pronouncements were around missions in Mali in Africa.

    The Irish Army deployed on two peace support missions to the African country in the Sahel – including an EU training mission for local soldiers and a Special Forces team from the Army Ranger Wing were involved with German troops in a United nations mission in the North of the country.

    Mali is gripped in a rebel insurgency in its northern Saharan reaches and also has Jihad inspired groups operating there. A recent coup has occurred and the country is currently, along with neighbours Burkina Faso and Niger, ruled by military dictatorships.

    Gardaí are examining previous interactions with the suspect.

    The male youth is currently detained at a garda station in the North Western Region.

    The scene is currently preserved and a technical examination will be carried out today by the Divisional Scenes of Crime Unit.

    “The Special Detective Unit of An Garda Síochána is involved in this investigation.

    “One line of enquiry is to establish if this attack had a terrorism motivation.
    The suspect remains in detention and is being questioned in a Garda station in the North Western region. Their period of detection has recently been extended.

    “An Garda Síochána wishes to reassure the public that at this time it is not believed this incident is part of a wider conspiracy.

    “A thorough investigation is underway and all relevant Bureaux have been engaged and are active in progressing this investigation.

    “The Garda Commissioner has spoken to the Defence Forces Chief of Staff and wishes the injured Defence Forces member a full and speedy recovery,” a spokesperson said.

    Chief of Staff of Óglaigh na hÉireann, Lieutenant General Seán Clancy, has sent his best wishes to the injured Padre.

    “Our thoughts are with our injured comrade, and we wish him a full and speedy recovery. The well-being of our personnel is our utmost priority, and we will continue to support him during this time,” he said.

    Clancy also spoke about the efforts of the young soldiers on duty at the gate to Renmore.

    ““The swift and decisive response by our personnel last night was exemplary, and in keeping with the highest standards of the Defence Forces and our values.

    “Their professionalism ensured that a dangerous situation was quickly brought under control, protecting the lives of others in the vicinity. There is no doubt that their actions were critical in preventing further harm or loss of life.”

    He added, “We are grateful to An Garda Síochána for their rapid response and ongoing assistance in the investigation. We will continue to cooperate fully with their efforts to bring this matter to a thorough and just conclusion.”

    ‘Horrifying attack’
    The president of Defence Forces union PDFORRA said members were “horrified” to hear of the attack on the army chaplain.

    “We are saddened by this horrific attack on the chaplain – we wish him a speedy recovery,” Mark Keane said.

    “We are horrified by this attack. Our thought and prayers are with the padre at this time and the members who witnessed the incident.”

    The group which represents officers of the Defence Forces has said it’s hugely concerned by the incident.

    “All members of the Defence Forces are disgusted and hugely concerned by this vicious, unprovoked attack on the Chaplain,” from Conor King, General Secretary of RACO.

    “We wish him a swift recovery and thank the members on duty in Renmore Barracks, whose actions undoubtedly saved his life.”

    Independent TD and former Army officer, Cathal Berry paid tribute to Fr Murphy.

    “I want to pass on my best wishes to Chaplain Paul Murphy and wish him a full and swift recovery.

    “I would also send my best wishes to the unit in Renmore and commend the actions of the sentries who saved two lives and used the minimum force necessary to end the incident. It is a textbook example of how to intervene in such a dangerous incident,” he said.

    Local councillor Alan Cheevers told RTÉ Radio One that the chaplain is “very much part of the community” of the Renmore area, having spent the past 12 years serving the barracks.

    “For something like this to happen in the area that predominantly has a very low crime rate and antisocial behavior rate, I suppose it’s really, really concerning,” Cheevers said.

    Bishop Michael Duignan of Galway said the attack was “deeply shocking and upsetting”.

    “I pray for the injured man, asking God that he would make a full recovery. I pray too for his family, for his army colleagues and for the medical personnel who are tending to his injuries at this time,” he added.

    Justice Minister Helen McEntee sent her best wishes to the injured Fr Murphy and paid tribute to the gardaí and Defence Forces soldiers who responded to the incident.

    1. It's always carefully worded, isn't it, so that they "condemn the attack" but never the attacker, as if the knife moved without human agency.

      1. We all know who it is. We all know the excuses they will make. The fact that the little scrote isn't a card carrying member of a terrorist group doesn't mean it isn't terrorism related. It is and it is gaining pace.

    2. It’s understood that the teenager is Irish and under the age of 18.

      He was a such a cute kid growing up.. and as about as Orish as Axel Rudakubana was Welsh.

    3. It’s understood that the teenager is Irish and under the age of 18.

      He was a such a cute kid growing up.. and as about as Orish as Axel Rudakubana was Welsh.

  87. I see that the inquest on the girl who died after drinking a drink with an ingredient to which was allergic has ended. The finding appears to be accidental death (though the paper does not state it clearly).

    Two things struck me. The mother of Hannah, described as “a happy, lively 13 year old girl, with an outspoken, strong personality” knew that her daughter suffered from an allergy which could kill her in an hour or so – but did NOT carry at least one (and preferably two) strong-dose Epipens.
    Seems barking to me. The girl, too, ought to have been so armed.

    Secondly, the mother told the shop assistant that the girl was allergic to milk and so the drink needed soya milk. From earlier reports of her evidence, it was clear that the woman serving had a very limited knowledge of English. I assume she heard the word "milk" and guessed they wanted, er, milk – and put milk in the mixture.

    The mother is called Abimbola Duyile; the serving woman Urmi Akter. I'll leave you to judge the level of mutual comprehension.

    Terrible waste of a young life – but I do believe that individuals with very risky allergies owe it to themselves to protect themselves

    1. My other question would be given that the child was on her way to a dental appointment, why the heck was she having a hot chocolate?

      1. "“a happy, lively 13 year old girl, with an outspoken, strong personality”

        This could suggest that, in fact, she was a demanding, loud-mouthed, stroppy, entitled pain in the arse. Who "insisted"….

        1. Then who is the ‘adult’? I’ve just spent 3 days with a ‘happy, lively 10 year old with a strong personality’ and although testing my limited patience she and I got on very well! Eventually!

    2. Caroline has coeliac disease and must not eat anything containing gluten so she knows how important diet can be.

      We ask all our students' parents to let us know of any allergies or other medical conditions of which we must be aware and, indeed, some of our students have brought medicines or an Epipen with them.

      We are in loco parentis while they are with us and so we have to be absolutely clear about any potential or foreseeable medical problems which might arise.

      1. Exactly right, Rastus:-) Do you think allergies are more numerous/widespread now? Seems to have really grown last couple of decades.

        1. I was pondering that. When I was at school in the UK from 1945 to 1958 I encountered, I suppose, about a thousand boys. I cannot think of one who was allergic to anything apart from games and the CCF.

          1. Seems to have exploded last few years, Bill. My guess is junk food. I was allergic to the games mistress, a real bully. Games master, hmm…. not so much 😀

          2. I enjoyed my time in the CCF not so much games -until they allowed me to go Ice Skating with some lovely lady instructors! I still have my Stiffticates!

          3. I enjoyed my time in the CCF not so much games -until they allowed me to go Ice Skating with some lovely lady instructors! I still have my Stiffticates!

          4. I enjoyed my time in the CCF not so much games -until they allowed me to go Ice Skating with some lovely lady instructors! I still have my Stiffticates!

        2. I think the explosion in allergies started way before that with the introduction of antibacterial sprays. People stopped getting the bugs they then became resistant to. We need to be exposed to bugs to gain that immunity.
          Edit Stopped

          1. Interesting. I think that could well be correct, Alf. Pleased and proud to say I’m doing my bit at not being super-clean…have dogs always trailing dirt in or bringing things in. I lecture them, they listen, nothing changes..seriously, not had a cold for many years although I did have Covid. …….

    4. From what I read Bill, her lips only touched the edge of the cup? She must have been extremely sensitive if so, should have had epipen on hand with instructions how to use it for others to read, and also her own food and drink. Bit of a drag, but best on safe side. So yes, your last sentence….

    5. Find with nut allergy always carries an Epipn.
      As does one our granddaughter's friends with the same problem.
      Neither makes a big issue of it; they are just cautious and are prepared.

    6. Some years ago I met briefly with a friend, work related, at a motorway service station. He treated me to a Costa coffee beverage. Overpriced and not nice. Within hours I suffered from an attack of diarrhea.
      As for the tragic child, it is possible to take the enzyme lactase in pill form; lactase helps the gut bacteria to digest lactose. The web informs me that lactose intolerance may have a genetic factor.

    7. Some years ago I met briefly with a friend, work related, at a motorway service station. He treated me to a Costa coffee beverage. Overpriced and not nice. Within hours I suffered from an attack of diarrhea.
      As for the tragic child, it is possible to take the enzyme lactase in pill form; lactase helps the gut bacteria to digest lactose. The web informs me that lactose intolerance may have a genetic factor.

  88. Here's a way in which Starmer and Rayner could help restore the British people's faith in free speech and democracy :

    How about Starmer offering a referendum to all the current residents of any town, village or hamlet earmarked for expansion to hold multitudes of immigrants to see whether they, the current residents, want it or not?

    1. If your suggestion was adopted the incomers would refuse to move there anyway, because of all the flying pigs.

      1. I think you are taking me a bit too literally.

        The Labour Party probably stopped being concerned about what ordinary people actually want soon after the time of Ramsay McDonald.

      2. I think you are taking me a bit too literally.

        The Labour Party probably stopped being concerned about what ordinary people actually want soon after the time of Ramsay McDonald.

  89. Tonight's Evening Standard newsletter in full.
    My bold etc., read on and see whether you think this is two tier, given recent events.

    An Edinburgh Fringe show hosted by the comedian, Reginald D Hunter, has this afternoon been cleared by police, who said no hate crime was established. Let's swiftly dispose of the initial incident, which is the least important part of the story.

    It began when Hunter referenced a documentary about domestic abuse, before reportedly telling the audience: “When I saw that, I thought, my god, it’s like being married to Israel.” While the gag drew laughter from the audience, a couple in the front row, who said they were Israeli, objected saying it was “not funny”. It was what followed next that is most revealing of our times, and was the subject of the alleged 'hate incident'.

    As crime correspondent Anthony France reports, the audience members were sworn at, called “genocidal” and told, “you’re not welcome” by fellow spectators, with slow-hand claps and boos while some shouted “Free Palestine”. In his review of the gig, Dominic Cavendish, chief theatre critic for The Telegraph, called it the “ugliest Edinburgh Fringe moment ever”.

    Hunter then reportedly recounted a story about how he was once informed that the Jewish Chronicle, the oldest continuously published Jewish newspaper in the world, would be reviewing his show. Afterwards, Hunter said his partner had sought out the review but could not access it online due to a paywall, to which he told the audience: “Typical f***ing Jews, they won’t tell you anything unless you subscribe," before adding "It's just a joke."

    This was a revealing statement for two reasons (notwithstanding the fact that Jewish Chronicle does not have a paywall.) First, it is the reflexive lurch for an antisemitic trope – that it is just so typical of Jews to be money-grubbing. And second, that Hunter felt at ease to share it. It is not difficult to understand why. After all, he was standing in front of a crowd who not only had paid to see him, but in effectively hounding out two Israeli audience members, had made the room appear a safe space for anti-Jewish slurs to be uttered.

    It is this attitude that is sometimes reflected across wider society. Earlier this month, an avowedly anti-racist demonstration in Finchley, North London – an area with a large Jewish community – was marred by an image online that read: "Get Fascists, Racists, Nazis, Zionists and Islamophobes out of Finchley." Sunder Katwala, director of the British Future think tank, explained: "Yes Ziomists [sic] "out of Finchley" means most Jews (and others) should leave the most Jewish area of London if they hold the wrong political views." Sarah Sackman, the local MP and solicitor general, condemned the poster as "clearly antisemitic".

    In a statement, Hunter said: "I do push boundaries in creating humour, it's part of my job… I regret any stress caused to the audience and venue staff members." It is possible that Bart Simpson gave a more convincing apology to the Australian government, but more to the point, perpetuating antisemitic tropes about money-obsessed Jews is the opposite of pushing boundaries – it is the most well-worn of rhetorical paths.

    One of his shows has since been cancelled by East Renfrewshire Culture and Leisure. Clearly, Hunter was well within his rights, not simply as a comedian but as a free person living in this country, to make a joke, funny or not, comparing Israel with domestic violence.

    The couple in question attended a gig in which they might have known the performer covered controversial topics. But the anti-Jewish racism that has become so normalised still ought to have the power to alarm us, and get people to call it out for what it is.

      1. The sick truth is that if it were a Jewish orphanage there are some sections of society which would find it most amusing.

    3. This was the ugliest Fringe moment I’ve ever witnessed

      The audience bayed at an Israeli couple during Reginald D Hunter’s stand-up show in Edinburgh

      Dominic Cavendish, Chief Theatre Critic • 12 August 2024 • 2:09pm

      Sunday night's performance by American stand-up Reginald D Hunter of his new Edinburgh Festival set ranks without doubt as the most unpleasant comedy gig I've ever attended. This came down to five minutes midway in when a theatre full of people erupted in vocal animosity at an Israeli couple who had briefly heckled Hunter.

      Hunter, 55, had made a crude point, rather than an especially sophisticated gag, where he said a Channel 5 documentary containing a scene about an abusive wife herself accusing her husband of abuse made him think, "My God, it's like being married to Israel." There was audience laughter in response, but not from the couple on the front row, who shouted "not funny".

      The pair, who said they were from Israel, then endured their fellow audience members shouting expletives ("f— off" among them), and telling them to go – with slow-hand claps, boos and cries of "genocidal maniac", "you're not welcome" and "free Palestine" part of the toxic mix.

      In the past I've had time for Hunter, a free-thinking outsider, who has lived in the UK since 1997. Amid a climate of censoriousness and offence-taking, his determination to tackle difficult subjects, without mincing his words, has usefully tested limits and galvanised debate. He's no stranger to controversy: he was accused of anti-Semitism at the 2006 Fringe for Holocaust material and has attracted ire for alleged misogyny and his use of the 'n word', whether in show-titles, shows or a furore-attracting hosting of the Professional Footballers' Association gala dinner in 2013.

      But here he gave an object lesson in how not to pick on people in the front row. Instead of tolerating the couple's joint heckle, he doubled down with a sinister air of beaming bellicosity: "I've been waiting for you all summer, where the f— you been?" He continued: "You can say it's not funny to you, but if you say it to a room full of people who laughed, you look foolish."

      "Look at you making everyone love Israel even more," he jeered, after the woman remonstrated with the audience.

      "That tells me that I still got voltage," he purred, with satisfaction, after the pair left, slowly (it turned out that the man was disabled, not that this caused a flicker of restraint in the host, who openly laughed at them). He then related a remark that his female partner had made at the time of the Holocaust controversy about accessing the Jewish Chronicle's website: "Typical f—ing Jews, they won't tell you anything unless you subscribe." "It's just a joke," he added.

      Earlier, amid typically laid-back ruminations on the riots, Trump, religious extremism and "excessive punditry", he spoke of the need for a man not to get too innocuously "fluffy" with age. But if countenancing a mob mentality and purveying an anti-Semitic trope is what passes for edgy in his book, then I've had my fill.

      https://www.telegraph.co.uk/comedy/what-to-see/reginald-d-hunter-edinburgh-fringe-festival-review

  92. Not quite Birdie Three?

    Wordle 1,154 3/6
    ⬜🟨⬜🟨🟨
    ⬜🟩🟨🟨⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. Five for me. Too many options.

      Wordle 1,154 5/6

      🟨⬜⬜🟨⬜
      🟨🟩🟨🟨⬜
      ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
      ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      1. 4 today.
        Wordle 1,154 4/6

        ⬜🟩⬜🟨⬜
        🟨🟩🟩⬜🟩
        ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    2. Options sue says, options

      Wordle 1,154 5/6

      ⬜🟨⬜🟨🟩
      ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜
      🟨🟩🟩⬜🟩
      ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    3. Late on parade after a good 5 o'clock club.
      Me too.

      Wordle 1,154 3/6

      ⬜🟨🟩⬜⬜
      🟨🟩🟩⬜🟩
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

        1. I'm pleased that a fair few of the local old gits are being swung towards an awakening of wokeness.

  93. ALL THE UNIONS GUNNING FOR BUMPER PAY RISES FROM LABOUR

    Border Force officials at Heathrow Airport have just announced fresh strikes. PCS, representing them, have expansive demands for civil servants including a reduced working week. The domino effect has begun – below are some of the public sector unions co-conspirators can expect will be demanding more taxpayer cash something to the tune of ASLEF or Junior Doctors’ bumper offers:

    Rail and Maritime Transport Workers Union: Demanding the same bumper pay offer given to ASLEF.
    Public and Commercial Services Union: Demanding a “cost-of-living” pay rise, 35 days annual leave, and “a significant shortening of the working week with no loss of pay.” Civil servants will be jumping with excitement…
    Local Government: Unite, Unison and GMB are now demanding a 5-6% pay rise for local government workers after Reeves capilated to the pay review bodies.
    Royal College of Nursing: Likely to continue campaign for a separate pay structure that increases nurse pay at a faster rate.
    General Practitioners: GPs are demanding an 11% pay rise. In line to be granted…
    Junior Doctors: Planning on striking again in 2025 even after Labour’s 22% pay rise.
    National Education Union: Campaigning for higher pay, a lower workload, and free school meals.
    National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers: Demanding a national commission on pay to hike it even more.
    Police Federation: Calling for higher pay.
    Fire Brigade Union: Took a 4% pay rise from the Tories, campaigning for more.
    The RMT’s Mick Lynch told the Times, external he expected a “parallel, synchronised offer” to ASLEF’s. It’s the Tory record causing tax rises, is it Rachel?

    16 August 2024 @ 16:15

      1. Was that before or after he'd rewarded the NUM for forcing Ted Heath into an early General Election?

      2. Didn't he say : 'That doesn't mean the taxman in your pocket' or words to that effect…

  95. Migrant who beheaded his victim and caused his intestines to spill out while still alive could avoid deportation from Germany 'because he will probably just come back from Somalia'..

    Shocked.. we are shocked. Thoughts & prayers are with zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

    1. Take him to Somalia and drop him from the plane at 30,000 feet, to allow him time to contemplate his own intestines spilling out.

    2. Yeah, cheaper and less bother to let him stay to reduce the local population. Saves time too.

    1. Darwin strikes again.

      Dolly does similar to Harry. When he is getting all pink penciled she puts her paw on his head and rams him into the cushions…..and holds him there.

      1. He well be an employee. Teaching zumba to us oldies. I intend to take it up myself. Walking circles in the park even with the Dolly and Harry show has become boring.
        Now there's a thought. Teach Dolly and Harry to Zumba !

  99. How Sue Gray is wielding power at the heart of Downing Street
    With great influence and a firm grip on Whitehall, Sir Keir Starmer’s chief of staff may well be Britain’s most powerful woman
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/08/16/how-sue-gray-is-wielding-power-at-downing-street/

    Would either Sue Gray now or Alastair Campbell in Blair's era have ever been able to wield such power and influence had they been in democratically elected positions?

    1. I have been waiting for someone to dig deep and find something on Miss Gray. I bet half the civil service are trying to, as well.

      2. On Twitt it was said that she was the landlady of a pub in a Republican area of northern Ireland in her youth? Not sure I can believe that!

          3. If you’re a lefty you can do whatever you like, safe in the knowledge that you’re always in the right!

          5. If you’re a lefty you can do whatever you like, safe in the knowledge that you’re always in the right!

      3. Sue Gray was born in north London in 1957, and is the daughter of Irish immigrants who moved to Tottenham in the early 1950s.

        She is suspected of having IRA sympathies and this may have led her to bring to bear her influence on this decision which shows her and Starmer up to be the truly repulsive people they are:

        British government to scrap Northern Ireland amnesty …

        Reuters
        https://www.reuters.com › world › british-government-s…
        Jul 17, 2024 — Britain's new government said on Wednesday it would scrap an amnesty scheme for ex-soldiers and militants involved in decades of violence in …

    1. Over 400 thousand people have now signed the petition against the government robbery of pensioners winter fuel allowances.

    3. Imagine if the eeeeevvvvviiiillllll ttoorrriiieeesss had stripped pensioners of their winter fuel allowance, bus passes, state pension. The MSm would have been in uproar

  101. That's me gone for this first day of a sort of normality. Maddeningly, I do get tired by 5 pm. I had to pack in the gardening, too.

    Still, small steps, eh?

    Have a spiffing evening drinkg hard.

    I shall not be around much tomorrow – half the MR's family are coming for lunch so I shall be under starter's orders from first thing!

    2. Well I'm glad you are getting back to normal – it's been quite a few days. Not been here much today as we had visitors.

    3. Good to have you back Bill. Behave yourself tomorrow and enjoy your family lunch. 😉🤗

  102. CAPTION CONTEST (GET ROUND THE TABLE EDITION)

    https://i0.wp.com/order-order.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Screenshot-2024-08-16-at-12.48.00.png?w=812&ssl=1
    Bruce Everiss
    4h
    Every time.

    https://image.vuukle.com/0fb1f625-47b3-4788-9031-5fe43d5ad981-f450ed0f-1d93-4b59-bf7c-fbce3e22abae

    Bill Quango MP
    3h
    “Money’s too tight for pensioners!”
    Simply Reds.

    Bill
    2h
    THIS IS ONLY THE BEGINNING, Labour will wreck everything as they ALWAYS do. Coming soon.. Shortages, Strikes, Power Cuts, Work to Rule, Three Day Weeks , Walkouts, Outrageous wage demands, Unburied dead, Uncollected Rubbish, Fuel and Food shortages, Mob Violence, MASSIVE tax increases, More Beurocracy, More Public Sector waste, More loss of rights and liberties. its only taken 6 weeks for it all to go wrong.

    1. Angie is saying 'Why do I have two left hands – and one much bigger than the other?? Tory thcum'

    2. Angie is saying 'Why do I have two left hands – and one much bigger than the other?? Tory thcum'

    5. I saw a headline earlier (details may differ) that ASLEF are refusing to discontinue train drivers strike, having refused 4% pay rise, saying they want 11% (sources say they may accept 8%). Current salary I think around 63k pa. Beer and sandwiches with Reeves & Rayner on the cards perhaps.

      1. Paradoxically, in the UK it is a disease spread by homosexuals. If it is to be believed, the Boat folk don't take too kindly to those spreading the disease…

    1. Excellent – I love Cohen and particularly 'Suzanne' and 'Dance me to the end of love' – wont post a link, it's easy to Google!

      1. The Al Pacino clip of 'Dance me' is rather good. I have The Songs of Leonard Cohen on LP…

      2. The Al Pacino clip of 'Dance me' is rather good. I have The Songs of Leonard Cohen on LP…

    2. I prefer the KD Lang version.
      I was starting a project down in Melbourne when she sang Hallelujah at the Vancouver Winter Olympics, I could have just packed up and flown home right there and then.
      There again that was before Trudeau made us ashamed of being Canadian.

        1. That’s John Cale, opopanax, a disciple of Cohen’s. The Buckley one is on YouTube, he sounds quite like his dad.

    1. I remember the 1976 bicentennial 4th July party in Geneva. The US expats provided beer and food stalls (all free) close to Le Jardin Anglais by the lake. All day fun and music. It was a weekend day I think. The difference is that the Yanks weren't trying to occupy Switzerland.

    2. It is incomprehensible why they don't eff off back there. What are they doing here? (Don't bother answering that)

    3. They will kill him first.
      Though most MO are by Millenials and GenZ now.

      So they will have to interfere with his E-Car…um. Won't work this time as it did for the last four journalist dying on their way to work on their normal commute.

      So how about a plane crash? …..Well that certainly worked in Poland when they needed a change of government and of course the woman who released Obama's birth certificate.

      What about Russian spies sneaking in with highly reactive isotopes? Maybe, but how would they get them past airport scanners?

      No worries there..easy peasy…they never check private jets.

      Really ? Yes my mirror…true. How else would we now have Scorpion machine guns on the streets. I hear grenades are going to be the firework of choice this year.

      So no plane crashes?

      Look…planes have been done to death…think outside the coffin !

      If you can fly away before it all goes off.

    4. That would be brilliant. But no Boris, please. Douglas Murray would be a good choice, or Raheem himself

    5. That would be brilliant. But no Boris, please. Douglas Murray would be a good choice, or Raheem himself

    6. Pretty Please.
      Just watching the Blob and it associated government narks and lickspittles spontaneously combust would be sooooooo satisfying.

  109. Yesterday, live on air,
    I met a far right man who wasn't there!
    He wasn't there again today,
    I wish, I wish he'd go away!

    When I came home last night at three,
    The far right was waiting there on the BBC
    But when I looked on News at Ten
    They were all locked up, until god knows when,
    Go away, go away, don't you come back any more!
    Go away, go away, stay off Channel Four

    Last night I saw live on air,
    A far right man who wasn't there
    He wasn't there again today
    Oh, how I wish he'd go away…

      1. Phizzee poetry…………

        Whores are paid by their customers.

        Need any more lessons? £50 a throw big boy.

  110. A local restaurant is serving a drink that they call Tits up in the rhubarb patch. It is a quite nice gin based cocktail and it might go well with your Minni di virgini.

    there were several raised eyebrows around the table when I ordered a tits up though.

  111. The real problem is there is so much crap hurtling towards us on so many different fronts that it is impossible for us as individuals to absorb it all and to make rational sense of it.
    I choose truth above everything else!

          2. From Coffee House, the Spectator

            The desecration of Canterbury cathedral
            Comments Share 16 August 2024, 4:28pm
            According to canon 1220 of the Catholic church’s code of canon law, ‘all those responsible are to take care that in churches such cleanliness and beauty are preserved as befit a house of God and that whatever is inappropriate to the holiness of the place is excluded’. So, if Canterbury cathedral were still Catholic, as it was for 900 years before the discordant event of the Reformation, it is fair to say that the ghost of Thomas Becket would not have been disturbed by the rave in the nave which took place last night and is repeated tonight.

            People wanting to visit the cathedral – and just possibly say their prayers there, which is the entire purpose of the building – yesterday encountered a notice saying: ‘Please note: the cathedral precincts will be closed to visitors from 17:00 today in preparation for the silent disco’.

            The event is in fact a repeat of the grisly silent disco held there in February which brought Britney and Eminem into the cathedral. For the event tonight, the playlist is outlined on the cathedral’s website:

            Dance to hits by Kylie, Madonna, Prince and many other artists of the 80s, in the magnificent, illuminated nave of Canterbury cathedral. Following the success of February’s 90s-inspired event – which saw hundreds of visitors joyously share a unique night out in support of a truly special location – we are bringing disco back this August with an 80s event!”

            The desecration, and I mean that exactly, of the cathedral was explained back in February by the Dean of Canterbury, the Very Rev. David Monteith, thus:

            Whilst dancing of all different kinds has happened in the Cathedral over the centuries, there are many different views on the secular and the sacred. Our 90s-themed silent disco will be appropriate to and respectful of the Cathedral – it is categorically not a ‘rave in the nave’ – but I appreciate that some will never agree that dancing and pop music have a place within cathedrals.

            Dr Monteith added: ‘Cathedrals have always been part of community life in a way much wider than their prime focus as centres of Christian worship.’

            Well, it’s not exactly David dancing before the Ark, is it? Come to that, Our Lord had words to say about those who turn a house of prayer into a den of thieves. Cathedrals have indeed been ‘part of community life’ for centuries – if you want an idea of what that involved, look no further than Nicholas Orme’s excellent Going to Church in Medieval England. But at no point, ever, did it entail the God-free exuberant secular funfest with glowsticks that you can see on the cathedral website. This event is not a gathering where the mind and heart are lifted to God – which is the purpose of the cathedral; the spirits of those in attendance are entirely moved by what’s happening on their headphones, elevated by drink, with the nave of the cathedral a numinous backdrop to the rave.

            The Dean should have been sacked after the last event rather than presiding over this repeat of the sacrilege. You have to ask: where is Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, whose seat this is meant to be? He was quick off the mark to scold rioters for ‘un-British’ behaviour but on the scandalous abuse of a cathedral established by St Augustine, whose successor he professes to be, he is uncharacteristically silent. He’s a nice man, but you can carry tolerance too far, and this is where tolerance has its limits.

            I don’t care if the raves raise thousands of pounds for the upkeep of this historic building; what’s the National Lottery for? I’d rather the rain came in through the roof than the cathedral be profaned. And I can with absolute confidence say that this would be the view of its founder.

            Canterbury cathedral was, courtesy of the martyrdom of Becket, the second most important pilgrimage site in Europe. It was a Catholic cathedral longer than it’s been a Protestant one. As I said on this subject before, if the CofE can’t look after it properly, can we have it back?

  112. Hamas plotted to dig up war graves of British war veterans

    Plan to exhume remains of soldiers and hold them 'prisoner' detailed in seven-page document shared with The Telegraph by Israeli officials

    Melanie Swan and Paul Nuki, GLOBAL HEALTH SECURITY EDITOR • 16 August 2024 • 7:57pm

    Hamas plotted to dig up the remains of British and Commonwealth troops buried in Gaza and blackmail the Government over their return, according to documents uncovered in the war-torn enclave.

    For more than a century The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC), chaired by the UK Defence Secretary and supported by the Crown, has maintained a cemetery in central Gaza containing the remains of more than 3,000 Commonwealth troops from the First and Second World Wars.

    Many of the soldiers buried there died fighting the Ottomans for control of the Strip in 1917, a bloody conflict that paved the way for the British administration of Palestine.

    The plot to exhume the remains of the soldiers and hold them "prisoner" is detailed in a seven-page document, shared with The Telegraph by Israeli officials.

    They say it was uncovered by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) on January 31 at a compound in Khan Younis linked to Hamas leaders Yahya Sinwar and Mohammed Deif.

    The Israelis believe it was written on or around October 5, 2022, by an unknown official, apparently in response to comments made by the then-prime minister Liz Truss on her desire to move the British Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

    Demands were to have included at least one of the following: a retraction of the Jerusalem statement, evacuation of the soldier's remains to cemeteries outside Gaza or the retrospective payment of land "lease fees" for the cemeteries dating back to 1917.

    "If the British government does not meet the aforementioned demands, the Gaza Municipality will act to remove all the corpses from the cemeteries and collect them in a special location by judicial order, declaring that the corpses are considered captive until a solution or deal is found," says the document.

    "The British government will find itself in an embarrassing position in front of the British people, its political elite and its military if any country desecrates the corpses of its soldiers."

    Although the document pre-dates the war in Gaza, the land holding the Commonwealth cemeteries remains under Hamas control and Israeli officials say the extortion threat remains real.

    "The tactic depicted in this document is intended to quite literally terrorise the people of the UK as a whole in order to influence political decisions," an Israeli official told The Telegraph. "There is no way to rule out that Hamas will use this strategy or other similar ones to influence external affairs or anything within their agenda in the future."

    Israeli officials say the document was found in a plastic sleeve among a cache related to the group's dealings with Hezbollah and other international terrorist organisations. It was marked "M'Raed".

    "[This] is possibly referring to Raed Salim Khalek, head of the Information and OSINT (open source intelligence) department in the Hamas military intelligence directorate", the Israeli intelligence commentary on the document adds.

    David Lammy, the Foreign Secretary, visited Israel on Friday as part of frantic diplomatic efforts to secure a ceasefire in Gaza that could prevent the region spiralling into all-out war.

    Mr Lammy said he was hopeful that Israel and Hamas were on the "cusp of a deal" as talks in Doha wrapped up on Friday.

    Hugh Lovatt, a Senior Policy Fellow at the Middle East and North Africa Programme at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said the document was "no obvious forgery" but there also no clear indication it was an official Hamas document. "I would usually expect a Quranic/Islamic header such as 'In the name of God the Merciful', he said.

    The tone used was also flowery and deferential – "not in itself a red flag, but not what I would expect from a 'working document'."

    The Commonwealth Cemeteries have been immaculately maintained for most of the time since their establishment in 1917 by local staff. However, the team that looked after it was evacuated to Egypt after Oct 7 and it is known the cemeteries suffered some damage in the recent fighting.

    The CWGC, a non-political organisation which carries out a "commemorative role" on behalf of the peoples of many nations, said it was shocked and saddened by the revelations.

    "Our sites are places of peace; global reminders of the human cost of war, and we are shocked by the suggestion that either they, or our war dead, should ever be used for political ends," said a spokesman.

    They added: "The CWGC will work with the international community to safeguard our interests in Gaza. We are continually monitoring the situation in Gaza and Israel. We are saddened by the recent damage to the Gaza War Cemetery and Deir El Belah War Cemetery, and when it is safe to do so, we will assess what future repairs will be needed and act accordingly."
    ___________________________________________________________

    'It's crossing a taboo and a red line'

    By Paul Nuki, Melany Swan in Tel Aviv and Fiona Parker in London

    By 1917, the Great War was in its fourth year, but the worst of the fighting in Gaza was yet to come.

    British troops had been defending the Suez Canal against attack by Turkey, then allied with Germany.

    But the decision was made in the War Office for several battalions to make a thrust from Egypt towards Jerusalem.

    The result was carnage. In two major battles in Gaza in March and April, around 6,000 British and Commonwealth soldiers lost their lives in heavy fighting against Turkish Ottoman troops.

    It would take another nine months for Britain to reach Jerusalem and topple the 400-year-old Ottoman Empire.

    A British officer wrote of the cost of the Gaza battles in his diary: "Lieutenants Allison and Foley with two troops charged a trench… and bayoneted thirty-two Turks, half of whom had put up their hands while the other half continued to shoot".

    "He died as he would have wished, in the midst of battle with his rifle in his hand," recalls another diary of a Commonwealth trooper who was "loved by all who knew him".

    It is the graves of these men and thousands of others like them that the terrorist group Hamas appears to have considered targeting in a cynical attempt to extort the British state.

    By digging up the remains of Britain's heroes and holding their bones "prisoner", they hoped to influence both the specifics and broad trajectory of British policy in the region, according to documents unearthed in Gaza by Israeli forces in January.

    By "collecting the corpses and not handing them over to Britain until Britain intervenes with the Zionist entity," Hamas would gain influence, the documents say.

    The Gaza War Cemetery and a second site, the Deir El Belah War Cemetery, also in Gaza, have been immaculately tended by local Palestinians working for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) for more than 100 years.

    The main site, located just 1.5 kilometres north-east of Gaza City, was once approached through a peaceful avenue of trees.

    It contains 3,217 Commonwealth burials from the First World War and 210 from the Second.

    Of the British soldiers who rest there, the great majority belong to the 52nd (Lowland), the 53rd (Welsh), the 54th (East Anglian) and the 74th (Yeomanry) Divisions.

    Martin Glen, the author of Gaza 1917: First Battle 26 March and Second Battle 19 April, told The Telegraph on Friday he was sickened by the idea that the remains of soldiers of any nationality could be treated in such a fashion.

    "What you're describing, maybe using the bodies of the soldiers as bargaining chips, just cuts me to the core," he said.

    "To actually hear that they considered digging up some of the bodies is so disrespectful, it shouldn't even ever be contemplated.

    Mark Urban, the former Newsnight diplomatic and defence editor, is among many Britons alive today who have relatives buried in Gaza.

    His great uncle, Lance Sergeant Walter Holmes, was killed in the Second Battle of Gaza on April 19, 1917, when he was 18 years old.

    His battalion, the Isle of Wight Rifles, launched its attack with over 800 men from which only 92 returned.

    "They were among 6,000 Allied casualties in a slaughter that rivalled some of the worst scenes on the Western Front", Mr Urban wrote after visiting his uncle's grave there in 2009.

    Paul Whatley, 70, whose great uncle Edward Whatley is buried in the Deir El Belah War Cemetery in Gaza, described the plan discussed in the document as "disgusting".

    Mr Whatley said he took great pride in his great-uncle, who was shot and died from his injuries aged 19 in 1917. He had served as a rifleman in the Hampshire Regiment and Mr Whatley's father, Edward, was named after him.

    "I'm disgusted that they'd consider using the bodies of soldiers as bargaining chips.

    "Nothing could ever justify doing something like that, I'm horrified", said the retired maintenance worker and father-of-five.

    Leslie Lloyd Roberts, the nephew of Lance Corporal Robert Edward Roberts, a bugler in the Royal Welsh Fusiliers who was killed in the First Battle of Gaza in 1917, also called for greater respect to be shown to the dead.

    The retired printworker, 85, told The Telegraph: "I'm very proud of my uncle. I have sympathy for the Palestinian people and I think they are probably having a very raw deal under Hamas. But this is terrorism, it isn't democracy.

    "At the very least, Hamas should have respect for the dead – especially fallen soldiers."

    According to the document, Hamas had been spurred into action by the then prime minister Liz Truss's October 2022 statement on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York that Britain was considering moving its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem – just as Donald Trump had done with the US embassy five years earlier.

    "If the British government does not meet the aforementioned demands, the Gaza Municipality will act to remove all the corpses from the cemeteries and collect them in a special location by judicial order, declaring that the corpses are considered captive until a solution or deal is found," says the document.

    Israeli intelligence officials say the extortion threat remains real as the cemeteries are within the terrorist organisation's control – or could do if a ceasefire is declared and Israeli forces withdraw from the Gaza Strip, as the US-brokered deal being negotiated in Doha envisages.

    "There is no way to rule out that Hamas will use this strategy or other similar ones to influence external affairs or anything within their agenda in the future," one Israeli official said on Thursday.

    The Telegraph has not been able to verify the document which was shared by an Israeli official, but has checked its translation, which three experts confirmed was accurate.

    The timing of the release of the document may or may not also be relevant. It has been released by the Israeli authorities amid a major diplomatic push for a ceasefire and hostage exchange in Gaza, potentially involving the withdrawal of Israeli troops and the renewed spectre of Hamas control.

    Israeli intelligence's interpretation of the document is that it represents a sophisticated attempt to influence UK policy and give Hamas leverage on several levels.

    First, it would "undermine and embarrass" the Palestinian Authority by showing Hamas was "taking advantage of every opportunity to support Jerusalem and keep it Arab, Muslim and Palestinian," the document argues.

    Second, it would force Britain to engage with Hamas, opening "opportunities for manoeuvring and bargaining", damaging Liz Truss and putting "the small, distant and besieged Gaza on the international agenda".

    Third, the move "will tie Jerusalem to Gaza and position Gaza as the defender of Jerusalem". And fifth, it would open "another front with the Zionist enemy through turning British support for Israel into pressure on it".

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/08/16/hamas-plan-dig-up-war-graves-british-war-veterans-gaza/

    1. '"At the very least, Hamas should have respect for the dead – especially fallen soldiers."'

      Haha!

    2. Hamas are barking up the wrong tree if they think this government has any respect for people who fought for their country. Only the relatives will be concerned.

  114. Evening, all. The new seating area is all but finished (just needs a few tweaks to sign it off). Usable, anyway.

    Labour has always had a nasty, vindictive streak against people it despises (the hard-working, entrepreneurial families who keep this country going and anybody who is aspirational). It prioritises the feckless, the dependent and the client state. We are in for a bumpy ride.

  115. 391685+ up ticks,

    Dt,

    Border Force to strike at Heathrow on last weekend of summer holidays
    Walkout by hundreds of passport control staff will cause disruption to thousands of families between Aug 31 and Sep 3

    If the border force at Dover (the cross channel ferry service ) were to come out also, that could be seen as the English in opposition to the invasion by …… doing nothing.

  116. Aaarrgggghhhhhhh …… have spent more hours than I care to contemplate trying – AGAIN – to get to grips with the art programme that Pet 'Pooter Nerd put on my lap top.
    ArtRage 5 is CRAP!!! Too clever by half.
    I Want Photo Shop Back.
    Next week's project is ….

    1. Sometimes it feels like they do it on purpose to make us explode.

      "Our new [whatever bit of technology you're tryihg to replace] does ALL THIS!!! for only twice the price and half the battery life."

      "No thanks, I don't need or want all that. Just one of the old ones, please. "

      "We don't do those any more."

    2. That poor child. How can parents be so cruel to their children? How can mothers connive at this abomination?

    1. If you were putting Lammy in a job he’s actually capable of doing with some competency, what would it be?

      1. Telephone Sanitation Engineer….but with a probationary period of at least 3 months

      2. Telephone Sanitation Engineer….but with a probationary period of at least 3 months

          1. Precisely. I have never aspired to be a Cabinet Minister.

            I'm much too busy licking windows and pointing at cars.

  123. Well, chums, the bedtime hour of 10 pm approaches. So I will wish you all a Good Night. Sleep well, and I hope to see you all refreshed tomorrow.

  127. After several months of wallowing in the Tory wetlands, Charles Moore returns to drier and firmer ground (although he unfortunately slips on a damp patch near the end).

    Two-tier policing risks turning white British people into another 'community group'

    Engaging with minorities through group 'leaders' has perverted policing. Let's not make that error again

    CHARLES MOORE • 16 August 2024 • 6:15pm

    On holiday during the recent riots, I got the over-lurid impression one tends to collect of events at home when abroad. Britain was burning, it seemed. The "far-Right" was taking over. Elon Musk said that civil war was "inevitable".

    Now I am back, it does not feel like that. It is true the trouble was widespread. Some of it – especially the attempt to set fire to an asylum hotel and the many assaults on police officers – was truly nasty.

    Nevertheless, the riots do not amount to a national earthquake. No one was killed. Most of the crowds were quite small. "No-go areas" were not created. There seemed to be no terrorist organisation, no co-ordinated insurrection, indeed nothing politically planned – just bitterness about high levels of immigration, opportunistically fanned.

    The scale of destruction and disorder was lower than in the riots of 2011, and much lower than in the 1981 riots in Brixton, Toxteth, Handsworth, Moss Side etc. In the Broadwater Farm riot of 1985, a mob of about 50 people set upon PC Keith Blakelock with machetes and knives and hacked and stabbed him to death. These latest, squalid riots did not attain such heights of horror.

    It is also true, as Tom Tugendhat, the former security minister, has pointed out, that Sir Keir Starmer was rather slow in reaction. He seemed not instinctively to understand the unique role of the prime minister in galvanising the entire official system (particularly in August, when it goes to sleep). But once he had belatedly convened the COBR committee, this gave the necessary signal. The law-and-order reaction was firm. Many arrests were made. Justice was swift – possibly too swift to ensure fairness in sentencing. The rioting stopped.

    I say all this not to play down what happened, but to try to approach it in the right way – not so much a terrible crisis as a serious warning.

    In one respect, the riots of the 1980s resemble the current ones. Both were started by false rumours, a problem that existed long before social media were born or thought of. In Brixton in April 1981, a black youth had been stabbed by three other black youths. Police came to his aid, but an angry crowd misinterpreted their behaviour as an arrest.

    In Southport last month, an unfounded rumour spread that the murder of three small girls had been the work of a Muslim asylum-seeker. In both cases, rioters wanted their prejudices – against the police in Brixton, against Muslim asylum-seekers in Southport – confirmed.

    In the same spirit, Nick Lowles, of the Left-wing campaign group, Hope Not Hate, published the untrue information that a Muslim woman in Middlesbrough had suffered an acid attack. Fired up, perhaps, more by hate than hope, he seemed to want to believe such a tale. Such fake news helps create an atmosphere in which Islamist vigilantes, some armed, appoint themselves the defenders of mosques.

    As a young journalist on this paper, I covered the Brixton riots and the ensuing Scarman report on them. I have seen it written recently that Mrs Thatcher, then prime minister, got a good grip on the situation. But my memory – and subsequent reading – tells me this was not so.

    Her instincts were sound: she sympathised with the looted shopkeepers rather than the rioting youth. But she was, for economic reasons, in a weak political position, so she reluctantly deferred to the more establishment views of the day, upheld by her home secretary, Willie Whitelaw. These were that rioting would be solved only if the police could engage with "community leaders".

    This view was not flat wrong. The police were frequently ignorant and prejudiced towards black people. They certainly needed better engagement.

    But the idea that ethnic minority communities must be dealt with chiefly through gatekeepers drawn from their own race or religion was a hangover from Britain's colonial past when "take me to your leader" was the rule of thumb. It was and is quite unsuitable for a country with a common citizenship and rule of law.

    Yet it has governed, constrained and sometimes even perverted British policing ever since. Instructed by the Macpherson report on the Stephen Lawrence case, policing in the 21st century has had to operate under the crazy doctrine that a racist incident is an incident so perceived by the victim or anyone else. So the police are hamstrung by the mere accusation.

    This helps explain, for example, why the Metropolitan Police have been so extraordinarily indulgent to the repeated, militant and anti-Semitic Gaza demonstrations in London that have been staged since October 7 last year (when, let it be remembered, Muslims massacred Jews, not the other way round).

    The Met have sought a deal with "credible partners" among march organisers, which has allowed Islamists to dominate the streets of London. It is almost the opposite of the policing "without fear or favour", which the Met Commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, says he practises. It is driven by fear, and offers favours.

    This is not formal "two-tier" policing. The police are themselves somewhat confused about how to police whom when. But there certainly has grown up a difference between how the police deal with self-identifying ethnic or religious groups (and some other groups, such as LGBT+) and how they deal with the rest of us, the great majority.

    That great majority are usually treated directly and individually by the police, according to law. We do not have any leaders claiming to speak for our community and most of us would not want them (other than MPs and local councillors). But we do not like it if others, by signing up to a group, get special treatment. Then we start to feel discriminated against.

    So perhaps one can discern, in the recent riots, feelings not completely dissimilar from those expressed by black people in the 1980s. Those who rioted in recent weeks – mostly male, white, poor and predominantly Northern – do sense, as did black Brixton rioters more than 40 years ago, that the state is against them. They see the police as the sharp end of that state's will, and so they resent them.

    In my view, the fierce reaction of the authorities to the riots has been broadly justified. When serious disorder starts, everyone needs to know quickly, and from the top, that it will be punished. But if it turns out that this firmness applies only to those whom the state packages as "far-Right", then it will cause more grievance still.

    The dreadful logic of the "community leaders" doctrine is that poor white people will seek their own community leaders to parlay with the powers that be and sit in police control rooms during demonstrations. One suspects that people like Tommy Robinson are hoping to achieve such salience. At the more respectable end, people like Nigel Farage may have similar ambitions.

    We should not be going that way. When identity politics began in this country, it was presented as improving the lot of minority groups, but in reality it creates a series of competing ghettos. In the last census, we were all asked to write down our ethnicity. I refused, writing "I am British" over all the boxes. But my desire to assert citizenship over race feels like a losing battle. "White British" or "white English" are categorisations that now appear on official forms.

    Sir Keir promises a "standing army" (a bad phrase for a country accustomed to policing by consent, not martial law) to keep order. He must not make the majority its mutinous conscripts.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/16/two-tier-policing-turning-white-british-community-group

    1. “to ensure fairness in sentencing. The rioting stopped.”

      There was no fairness. The rioting may have stopped, but the sense of grievance has quadrupled,

        1. Lord Moore still writes well, but as an elitist.
          Very upsetting to see him refer to "the murder of three small girls". Young yes, little maybe, but small never; they did not go gentle into that good night. As for (alleged) murder, if the hoi polloi hadn't expressed their anger, one suspects that the case would have been hushed up, like that of the Caldocane killer and that mentally ill child-stabber in Ireland, and the female Albanian throat cutter.
          However, I enjoyed his euphemism "published the untrue information", which brought back memories of Sir Robert Armstrong mentioning 'being economical with the truth' during the attempt to block the publication of Peter Wright's memoir in the 1980s.

          1. I think you're right – brushed under the carpet of diversity strength, big city, get used to it lies.

            It's NOT normal. It IS wrong. Children WERE safe before the acid of foreigners was poured on us.

            What is the state's response? Not an acknowledgement that something is catastrophically wrong with society but more insults, more labels, a desperate attempt to 'brand' those they hate so completely to silence them. Yet all it's done is remind those people why they rioted.

            The offensive sentences are just big fat state abusing it's power. Power it has been eager to use specifically to suppress it's political enemy : the public.

          2. To be fair, Baron Moore of Etchingham is hamstrung; although of retirement age he needs to earn money to maintain his town & country residences. He dare not express himself emotionally like Allison Pearson or Katie Hopkins, especially as in the Southport case the main suspect has been charged and a Crown Court trial will not be rushed.

        2. Lord Moore still writes well, but as an elitist.
          Very upsetting to see him refer to "the murder of three small girls". Young yes, little maybe, but small never; they did not go gentle into that good night. As for (alleged) murder, if the hoi polloi hadn't expressed their anger, one suspects that the case would have been hushed up, like that of the Caldocane killer and that mentally ill child-stabber in Ireland, and the female Albanian throat cutter.
          However, I enjoyed his euphemism "published the untrue information", which brought back memories of Sir Robert Armstrong mentioning 'being economical with the truth' during the attempt to block the publication of Peter Wright's memoir in the 1980s.

        3. Lord Moore still writes well, but as an elitist.
          Very upsetting to see him refer to "the murder of three small girls". Young yes, little maybe, but small never; they did not go gentle into that good night. As for (alleged) murder, if the hoi polloi hadn't expressed their anger, one suspects that the case would have been hushed up, like that of the Caldocane killer and that mentally ill child-stabber in Ireland, and the female Albanian throat cutter.
          However, I enjoyed his euphemism "published the untrue information", which brought back memories of Sir Robert Armstrong mentioning 'being economical with the truth' during the attempt to block the publication of Peter Wright's memoir in the 1980s.

    2. Keir Starmer is a low IQ and below average solicitor specialising I assume in Human Rights legislation. His reaction to any adverse event is to prosecute whereas his purpose-full response as a British Prime Minister is to mediate and try to resolve conflict by so doing.

      As the great US lawyer Robert Barnes remarked our British government comprises “nut jobs”. None are qualified to the tasks assigned to them, few have any experience of the real world, that is the world existing outside of their very precious Parliamentary and Political Party bubble.

      No one can exist for long in an artificial bubble as our present lot of habitual freeloaders are about to discover. Come in Number 10, your time is up. The idiots among us gave you the promise of five years but after a few months but you have defaulted on your initial promises (nothing new there) and are to be consigned to the waste heap of history.

    3. Keir Starmer is a low IQ and below average solicitor specialising I assume in Human Rights legislation. His reaction to any adverse event is to prosecute whereas his purpose-full response as a British Prime Minister is to mediate and try to resolve conflict by so doing.

      As the great US lawyer Robert Barnes remarked our British government comprises “nut jobs”. None are qualified to the tasks assigned to them, few have any experience of the real world, that is the world existing outside of their very precious Parliamentary and Political Party bubble.

      No one can exist for long in an artificial bubble as our present lot of habitual freeloaders are about to discover. Come in Number 10, your time is up. The idiots among us gave you the promise of five years but after a few months but you have defaulted on your initial promises (nothing new there) and are to be consigned to the waste heap of history.

    4. Sir Keir promises a "standing army" (a bad phrase for a country accustomed to policing by consent, not martial law) to keep order.

      Just "a bad phrase"? Really?

      More a threat from someone who hadn't got a grip on events. Certainly not a phrase that would take the heat out of a problem where passions were running high.

    5. Massive uncontrolled gimmigration was always a disaster. It doesn't, could never and will never work. Same as you couldn't have the Romans in Anglo Saxon England with military occupation or English rule in Scotland.

      It was pure and simple Left wing malice that forced alien cultures – not the Europeans, they, by and large are law abiding quiet folk who came here to work – fundamentally foreign cultures that carried their own identity and outlook with them with no interest in changing what they were. Plod turned a blind eye to these atrocities for fear of being called racist because of people like Two Tier Kier who forced the appalling 'human wrongs act' on us.

      Where before we had one set of values, one moral code and a functioning society now we've dreadful infestations of visibly different aliens who all live together and hate the native culture while living parasitically off it. Now the host is dying because the parasites are eating too much, encouraged by the state to do so.

      For as long as the nasty, unwanted thoroughly alien cultures are emboldened by two tier Left wing state we will only go backward. The Gaza riots should have been suppressed, and, ideally, deported. But everyone knows they'd have got uppity and kicked off.

      Frankly, the alien needs to go.

    6. I do not see that “community leaders" doctrine is that poor white people will seek their own community leaders to parlay with the powers that be and sit in police control rooms during demonstrations and nor do I feel that’s what NF is after at all. The Ropers are determined to take over the rule of the U.K. and are well on the way to doing so. Community leaders doctrine is simply to obtain and take advantage of all the laws of this land including the “protected characteristics”. These are laws passed by our own governments and will never be repealed. And, btw, there is no official document that I know of where “White English” is an option.

      1. "…nor do I feel that’s what NF is after at all."

        That was my reference to Moore's slip. His argument is otherwise sound and he is firm on it even afterwards i.e. there is danger of a Balkanisation of England. Robinson and Farage have warned of it because they don't want to be a part of it.

  128. After several months of wallowing in the Tory wetlands, Charles Moore returns to drier and firmer ground (although he unfortunately slips on a damp patch near the end).

    Two-tier policing risks turning white British people into another 'community group'

    Engaging with minorities through group 'leaders' has perverted policing. Let's not make that error again

    CHARLES MOORE • 16 August 2024 • 6:15pm

    On holiday during the recent riots, I got the over-lurid impression one tends to collect of events at home when abroad. Britain was burning, it seemed. The "far-Right" was taking over. Elon Musk said that civil war was "inevitable".

    Now I am back, it does not feel like that. It is true the trouble was widespread. Some of it – especially the attempt to set fire to an asylum hotel and the many assaults on police officers – was truly nasty.

    Nevertheless, the riots do not amount to a national earthquake. No one was killed. Most of the crowds were quite small. "No-go areas" were not created. There seemed to be no terrorist organisation, no co-ordinated insurrection, indeed nothing politically planned – just bitterness about high levels of immigration, opportunistically fanned.

    The scale of destruction and disorder was lower than in the riots of 2011, and much lower than in the 1981 riots in Brixton, Toxteth, Handsworth, Moss Side etc. In the Broadwater Farm riot of 1985, a mob of about 50 people set upon PC Keith Blakelock with machetes and knives and hacked and stabbed him to death. These latest, squalid riots did not attain such heights of horror.

    It is also true, as Tom Tugendhat, the former security minister, has pointed out, that Sir Keir Starmer was rather slow in reaction. He seemed not instinctively to understand the unique role of the prime minister in galvanising the entire official system (particularly in August, when it goes to sleep). But once he had belatedly convened the COBR committee, this gave the necessary signal. The law-and-order reaction was firm. Many arrests were made. Justice was swift – possibly too swift to ensure fairness in sentencing. The rioting stopped.

    I say all this not to play down what happened, but to try to approach it in the right way – not so much a terrible crisis as a serious warning.

    In one respect, the riots of the 1980s resemble the current ones. Both were started by false rumours, a problem that existed long before social media were born or thought of. In Brixton in April 1981, a black youth had been stabbed by three other black youths. Police came to his aid, but an angry crowd misinterpreted their behaviour as an arrest.

    In Southport last month, an unfounded rumour spread that the murder of three small girls had been the work of a Muslim asylum-seeker. In both cases, rioters wanted their prejudices – against the police in Brixton, against Muslim asylum-seekers in Southport – confirmed.

    In the same spirit, Nick Lowles, of the Left-wing campaign group, Hope Not Hate, published the untrue information that a Muslim woman in Middlesbrough had suffered an acid attack. Fired up, perhaps, more by hate than hope, he seemed to want to believe such a tale. Such fake news helps create an atmosphere in which Islamist vigilantes, some armed, appoint themselves the defenders of mosques.

    As a young journalist on this paper, I covered the Brixton riots and the ensuing Scarman report on them. I have seen it written recently that Mrs Thatcher, then prime minister, got a good grip on the situation. But my memory – and subsequent reading – tells me this was not so.

    Her instincts were sound: she sympathised with the looted shopkeepers rather than the rioting youth. But she was, for economic reasons, in a weak political position, so she reluctantly deferred to the more establishment views of the day, upheld by her home secretary, Willie Whitelaw. These were that rioting would be solved only if the police could engage with "community leaders".

    This view was not flat wrong. The police were frequently ignorant and prejudiced towards black people. They certainly needed better engagement.

    But the idea that ethnic minority communities must be dealt with chiefly through gatekeepers drawn from their own race or religion was a hangover from Britain's colonial past when "take me to your leader" was the rule of thumb. It was and is quite unsuitable for a country with a common citizenship and rule of law.

    Yet it has governed, constrained and sometimes even perverted British policing ever since. Instructed by the Macpherson report on the Stephen Lawrence case, policing in the 21st century has had to operate under the crazy doctrine that a racist incident is an incident so perceived by the victim or anyone else. So the police are hamstrung by the mere accusation.

    This helps explain, for example, why the Metropolitan Police have been so extraordinarily indulgent to the repeated, militant and anti-Semitic Gaza demonstrations in London that have been staged since October 7 last year (when, let it be remembered, Muslims massacred Jews, not the other way round).

    The Met have sought a deal with "credible partners" among march organisers, which has allowed Islamists to dominate the streets of London. It is almost the opposite of the policing "without fear or favour", which the Met Commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, says he practises. It is driven by fear, and offers favours.

    This is not formal "two-tier" policing. The police are themselves somewhat confused about how to police whom when. But there certainly has grown up a difference between how the police deal with self-identifying ethnic or religious groups (and some other groups, such as LGBT+) and how they deal with the rest of us, the great majority.

    That great majority are usually treated directly and individually by the police, according to law. We do not have any leaders claiming to speak for our community and most of us would not want them (other than MPs and local councillors). But we do not like it if others, by signing up to a group, get special treatment. Then we start to feel discriminated against.

    So perhaps one can discern, in the recent riots, feelings not completely dissimilar from those expressed by black people in the 1980s. Those who rioted in recent weeks – mostly male, white, poor and predominantly Northern – do sense, as did black Brixton rioters more than 40 years ago, that the state is against them. They see the police as the sharp end of that state's will, and so they resent them.

    In my view, the fierce reaction of the authorities to the riots has been broadly justified. When serious disorder starts, everyone needs to know quickly, and from the top, that it will be punished. But if it turns out that this firmness applies only to those whom the state packages as "far-Right", then it will cause more grievance still.

    The dreadful logic of the "community leaders" doctrine is that poor white people will seek their own community leaders to parlay with the powers that be and sit in police control rooms during demonstrations. One suspects that people like Tommy Robinson are hoping to achieve such salience. At the more respectable end, people like Nigel Farage may have similar ambitions.

    We should not be going that way. When identity politics began in this country, it was presented as improving the lot of minority groups, but in reality it creates a series of competing ghettos. In the last census, we were all asked to write down our ethnicity. I refused, writing "I am British" over all the boxes. But my desire to assert citizenship over race feels like a losing battle. "White British" or "white English" are categorisations that now appear on official forms.

    Sir Keir promises a "standing army" (a bad phrase for a country accustomed to policing by consent, not martial law) to keep order. He must not make the majority its mutinous conscripts.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/16/two-tier-policing-turning-white-british-community-group

  129. After several months of wallowing in the Tory wetlands, Charles Moore returns to drier and firmer ground (although he unfortunately slips on a damp patch near the end).

    Two-tier policing risks turning white British people into another 'community group'

    Engaging with minorities through group 'leaders' has perverted policing. Let's not make that error again

    CHARLES MOORE • 16 August 2024 • 6:15pm

    On holiday during the recent riots, I got the over-lurid impression one tends to collect of events at home when abroad. Britain was burning, it seemed. The "far-Right" was taking over. Elon Musk said that civil war was "inevitable".

    Now I am back, it does not feel like that. It is true the trouble was widespread. Some of it – especially the attempt to set fire to an asylum hotel and the many assaults on police officers – was truly nasty.

    Nevertheless, the riots do not amount to a national earthquake. No one was killed. Most of the crowds were quite small. "No-go areas" were not created. There seemed to be no terrorist organisation, no co-ordinated insurrection, indeed nothing politically planned – just bitterness about high levels of immigration, opportunistically fanned.

    The scale of destruction and disorder was lower than in the riots of 2011, and much lower than in the 1981 riots in Brixton, Toxteth, Handsworth, Moss Side etc. In the Broadwater Farm riot of 1985, a mob of about 50 people set upon PC Keith Blakelock with machetes and knives and hacked and stabbed him to death. These latest, squalid riots did not attain such heights of horror.

    It is also true, as Tom Tugendhat, the former security minister, has pointed out, that Sir Keir Starmer was rather slow in reaction. He seemed not instinctively to understand the unique role of the prime minister in galvanising the entire official system (particularly in August, when it goes to sleep). But once he had belatedly convened the COBR committee, this gave the necessary signal. The law-and-order reaction was firm. Many arrests were made. Justice was swift – possibly too swift to ensure fairness in sentencing. The rioting stopped.

    I say all this not to play down what happened, but to try to approach it in the right way – not so much a terrible crisis as a serious warning.

    In one respect, the riots of the 1980s resemble the current ones. Both were started by false rumours, a problem that existed long before social media were born or thought of. In Brixton in April 1981, a black youth had been stabbed by three other black youths. Police came to his aid, but an angry crowd misinterpreted their behaviour as an arrest.

    In Southport last month, an unfounded rumour spread that the murder of three small girls had been the work of a Muslim asylum-seeker. In both cases, rioters wanted their prejudices – against the police in Brixton, against Muslim asylum-seekers in Southport – confirmed.

    In the same spirit, Nick Lowles, of the Left-wing campaign group, Hope Not Hate, published the untrue information that a Muslim woman in Middlesbrough had suffered an acid attack. Fired up, perhaps, more by hate than hope, he seemed to want to believe such a tale. Such fake news helps create an atmosphere in which Islamist vigilantes, some armed, appoint themselves the defenders of mosques.

    As a young journalist on this paper, I covered the Brixton riots and the ensuing Scarman report on them. I have seen it written recently that Mrs Thatcher, then prime minister, got a good grip on the situation. But my memory – and subsequent reading – tells me this was not so.

    Her instincts were sound: she sympathised with the looted shopkeepers rather than the rioting youth. But she was, for economic reasons, in a weak political position, so she reluctantly deferred to the more establishment views of the day, upheld by her home secretary, Willie Whitelaw. These were that rioting would be solved only if the police could engage with "community leaders".

    This view was not flat wrong. The police were frequently ignorant and prejudiced towards black people. They certainly needed better engagement.

    But the idea that ethnic minority communities must be dealt with chiefly through gatekeepers drawn from their own race or religion was a hangover from Britain's colonial past when "take me to your leader" was the rule of thumb. It was and is quite unsuitable for a country with a common citizenship and rule of law.

    Yet it has governed, constrained and sometimes even perverted British policing ever since. Instructed by the Macpherson report on the Stephen Lawrence case, policing in the 21st century has had to operate under the crazy doctrine that a racist incident is an incident so perceived by the victim or anyone else. So the police are hamstrung by the mere accusation.

    This helps explain, for example, why the Metropolitan Police have been so extraordinarily indulgent to the repeated, militant and anti-Semitic Gaza demonstrations in London that have been staged since October 7 last year (when, let it be remembered, Muslims massacred Jews, not the other way round).

    The Met have sought a deal with "credible partners" among march organisers, which has allowed Islamists to dominate the streets of London. It is almost the opposite of the policing "without fear or favour", which the Met Commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, says he practises. It is driven by fear, and offers favours.

    This is not formal "two-tier" policing. The police are themselves somewhat confused about how to police whom when. But there certainly has grown up a difference between how the police deal with self-identifying ethnic or religious groups (and some other groups, such as LGBT+) and how they deal with the rest of us, the great majority.

    That great majority are usually treated directly and individually by the police, according to law. We do not have any leaders claiming to speak for our community and most of us would not want them (other than MPs and local councillors). But we do not like it if others, by signing up to a group, get special treatment. Then we start to feel discriminated against.

    So perhaps one can discern, in the recent riots, feelings not completely dissimilar from those expressed by black people in the 1980s. Those who rioted in recent weeks – mostly male, white, poor and predominantly Northern – do sense, as did black Brixton rioters more than 40 years ago, that the state is against them. They see the police as the sharp end of that state's will, and so they resent them.

    In my view, the fierce reaction of the authorities to the riots has been broadly justified. When serious disorder starts, everyone needs to know quickly, and from the top, that it will be punished. But if it turns out that this firmness applies only to those whom the state packages as "far-Right", then it will cause more grievance still.

    The dreadful logic of the "community leaders" doctrine is that poor white people will seek their own community leaders to parlay with the powers that be and sit in police control rooms during demonstrations. One suspects that people like Tommy Robinson are hoping to achieve such salience. At the more respectable end, people like Nigel Farage may have similar ambitions.

    We should not be going that way. When identity politics began in this country, it was presented as improving the lot of minority groups, but in reality it creates a series of competing ghettos. In the last census, we were all asked to write down our ethnicity. I refused, writing "I am British" over all the boxes. But my desire to assert citizenship over race feels like a losing battle. "White British" or "white English" are categorisations that now appear on official forms.

    Sir Keir promises a "standing army" (a bad phrase for a country accustomed to policing by consent, not martial law) to keep order. He must not make the majority its mutinous conscripts.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/16/two-tier-policing-turning-white-british-community-group

  130. Another day is done, so, I wish you a goodnight and may God bless all you Gentlefolk. If we are spared! Bis morgen früh.

  132. I’ve been AWOL today so just popping in to say hello before I go out and check all you posts.

    I was talked into having a small dinner party tonight, which I don’t mind at all. It was my rather delicious (if I say so myself) chicken tikka masala, home-made cumin naan and pilau rice, followed by mango pannacotta.

    I am a big fan of beer (and wine); and my one friend has been knighted by the Belgians for her services to beer. She represents the American beer association in. Europe. What a job! Anyway my reward for hosting tonight is a whole load of rather nice American craft ale, which normally is unavailable in GB.

    I am just finishing off the remains. I am off to Cardiff tomorrow to meet my Iranian friend, who is a concert to Christianity and has very harsh words on about our peaceful friends. I remember her me warning me 30+ years ago, but of course I couldn’t see it then. Exactly as she has said. So the Govt. must have known. It cannot have been a surprise, what has happened recently.

    2. I knew more than 50 years ago, so it very definitely cannot have been a surprise to our government, when I first saw them shuffling around the Staines/Hounslow area (I was visiting a friend in Windsor). I thought government had taken leave of its senses.

      Mango pannacotta sounds delicious.

  134. Something odd has happened to the organisation of the page. Or am I going off my head?

  135. Something odd has happened to the organisation of the page. Or am I going off my head?

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